INTELLIGENT DESIGN

WITH THE CREATOR ARR IV ING JUST AS THE CONVERSATION AROUND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE BECOMES MORE FEVERED THAN EVER, TOTAL FILM TALKS TO EXPERTS TO FIND OUT JUST HOW REALISTIC ON-SCREEN SCI-FI IS. SHOULD WE BE WORRIED ABOUT SKYNET YET?

- MATT MAYTUM

Artificial intelligence hasn’t taken over the world just yet, but it has certainly dominated the conversation this year. While the idea of the sentient machine has long been a staple of science-fiction, going back as far as 1927’s Metropolis (and even further in literature, with Samuel Butler’s Erewhon in 1872 widely considered the first notable example), it has never been a hotter topic than it is now, as the real world begins to catch up with authors’ and screenwriters’ imaginations.

Just look at this year’s crop of blockbusters to see how entrenched in the public consciousness AI has become. There’s The Creator, of course, but AI also plays a prominent role in M3GAN, Heart of Stone and Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One. And in recent years the topic has also been explored in the varied likes of Kimi, Brian and Charles, Free Guy and After Yang. Filmmakers are reflecting fears and excitement, as AI takes substantial leaps forward.

ChatGPT and Google’s Bard have demonstrated the potential of generative AI, while art tools like DALL·E 2 offer the potential to create any image in any style. What are the limits? With the rise of deepfakes, Wes Anderson can’t be the only auteur concerned about being replaced by code: generative AI tools have made fake trailers for Anderson’s take on Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and more. The BBFC recently announced tentative steps in AI helping to classify content.