In a recent profile with The Hollywood Reporter, Johnson called out the widespread use of AI, saying, “Yeah, f*** AI. It’s something that’s making everything worse in every single way—I don’t get it. I mean, I get it in a ‘This makes sense to save money by not paying artists’ way.’ But then, what the f*** are we doing? Is this where we want to be?”
Guillermo del Toro, who is currently doing a press tour for Frankenstein and who is one of Johnson’s friends, is also staunchly anti-AI. Talking to variety, del Toro said, “AI, particularly generative AI — I am not interested, nor will I ever be interested,” del Toro said. “I’m 61, and I hope to be able to remain uninterested in using it at all until I croak. … The other day, somebody wrote me an email, said, ‘What is your stance on AI?’ And my answer was very short. I said, ‘I’d rather die.'”
Johnson’s similar stance comes as no surprise for the filmmaker, who has always been adamant about working closely with real people and real artists.
“We’re really committed to finding and encouraging new voices that are, for lack of a better word, commercial in their sensibilities,” he also told THR. “We want interesting people who have something to say and who want to connect with audiences and bring people in. I think that is essential.”
There really is no point in using AI for art that doesn’t boil down to saving money. It is not original, and it often looks terrible and like AI. Coca-Cola, for example, has yet to learn this lesson. As I stated back in that article, AI is a robot. It cannot think for itself, and therefore cannot experience the emotions that make art what it is. Rather it is, essentially, a facade, and a cheap one at that.
The concerning thing is that the industry will either learn its lesson and the bubble will pop, or it won’t, and we risk more strikes and a shrinking pool of people willing to risk their own creative property–and likenesses.
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