An AI to resurrect the dead
The clash in Hollywood between actors and studios is intensifying. Film labels intend to hire dead actors brought back to the scene thanks to AI without the consent of the heirs and without compensation
New front opened between the Hollywood studios and the American actors' union ( SAG-AFTRA ), which recently took to the streets to demonstrate its opposition to the use of artificial intelligence for the creation of film music, screenplays or directly on stage, at the place of flesh and blood actors. If, in fact, on many aspects of the dispute, it now seemed that the parties were close to an agreement, the last package of offers that the studios put forward as the "last and best offer" to put an end to the strike was returned to the sender. Reason? Film companies claim to use AI to bring dead actors back to the set.
BEFORE AI THE DEAD WERE ALREADY ON THE BIG SCREEN
So far there would be nothing strange, because the magical Hollywood, it is known, has been resurrecting artists who died prematurely for decades now. Well before the advent of computer graphics and other algorithmic devilry, for example, the good Peter Sellers found himself making a posthumous film two years after his death, in 1982, In the Footsteps of the Pink Panther . It was the first film in which the actor didn't even shoot a scene alive: in fact, fiction was usually resorted to when his death occurred halfway through filming. Since technology was what it was at the time, clips from other films in the series that had previously been discarded from the original works were used.
Bruce Lee was brought back to life to film the missing scenes in Chen's Last Stand and of which he had only shot one scene thanks to old close-ups of the actor and stunt doubles often disguised with sunglasses and full-face helmets.
The result obtained by the production of Wagons East was even more false, with the unforgettable John Candy , who died shortly before the end of filming. The actor was thus taken by the footage, cut out and stuck onto different backdrops. The result obviously cannot be said to be the best.
The best-known episode naturally concerns Brandon Lee , who died on the set of The Crow , in an absurd way, given that he was hit by a real bullet from a weapon that should have been loaded with blanks. The actor was extensively reconstructed in computer graphics to complete the film, making him the second Lee, after his father Bruce, to return to life on screen.
There are two most recent cases. The most tragic one involved Paul Walker , who died prematurely and mockingly in a car accident only to be recreated digitally for some of the closing sequences of Fast and Furious 7 . The most touching one resurrected Harold Ramis and his character Egon Spengler in the penultimate film of the series, Ghostbusters Afterlife .
WHAT STUDIOS DEMAND NOW
In short, Hollywood is no stranger to this type of digital miracle, so where is the problem? For the actors' union, the production companies would like to be able to recreate the appearance of the dead actors using artificial intelligence without having to first obtain any consent from the rights holders, i.e. the artist's surviving family members. By contract, actors who earn more than $32,000 per television episode or $60,000 per film would have to undergo a real scan for AI that would digitally recreate them in voice, appearance, facial expressions and poses.
AMPTP TAKES COVERAGE
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) in the original plans would like to pay the actor only at the time of the scan which will digitize the artist, recreating a convenient and practical digital backup copy, to be saved on hard disk or cloud and to be brought into the scene in the event of death, but without further compensation regardless of the exploitation of the 3D avatars.
In short, the AMPTP aimed to exploit these clones indefinitely and indefinitely, but when the matter was brought to the attention of the media by the enraged actors, the Alliance immediately took action by proposing a new agreement that requires consensus. The matter of compensation remains to be understood.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/una-ia-da-fare-resuscitare-i-morti/ on Sat, 11 Nov 2023 07:34:13 +0000.