By IMAX has revealed plans for an AI-supported short-film showcase… and, as expected, the internet is furious.
Per its official website, the company is staging Runway’s third installment of the AI Film Festival; it is billed as a “salute to creatives welcoming cutting-edge generative tools into the cinematic process.” More than 6,000 shorts were entered; a jury has winnowed the field to ten, set to screen in IMAX auditoriums across the country. Runway, the New York–based generative-AI lab launched in 2018, provided the platform on which each selected project was built. The judging roster features filmmakers Gaspar Noé and Harmony Korine, the latter now under a first-look pact with Runway for his second algorithm-aided feature (fresh off the viral venture best remembered for its nightmare-inducing infant faces).
The reveal triggered a tidal wave of criticism—most of it comprised of curse words we can’t print. One detractor claimed they’d sooner “yank out every eyelash, one by one” than buy a ticket.
“I’d genuinely prefer to rewatch The Room,” another wrote, referencing Tommy Wiseau’s cult oddity widely mocked as one of cinema’s lowest points (but which, in my living-room awards season, is a perennial Best Picture). “At least that disaster was crafted manually.”
“Machine-made output will remain counterfeit creativity, no matter how precisely it mimics the real thing,” someone else argued.
Generative systems not only raise thorny ethical issues, they’re also an environmental burden. As the planet keeps broiling, we can look forward to more seven-fingered JPEGs and ChatGPT cheerfully suggesting you tinker with a toaster using cutlery.
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