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New Wes Anderson Trend Has Twitter Debating The Value of AI Art

in Entertainment, Technology

Posted on by Melanie Weir
AI generated Wes Anderson version of Lord of the Rings

Credit: u/curious_refuge (Reddit)

Ever since it arrived on the scene, the presence of AI in creative spaces has been a hotly debated topic. Some argue that allowing a computer to do your work for you is not creative; others contend that AI is a learning tool that will allow for new modes of creativity to be discovered.

This debate has been renewed now in the face of a fake trailer, made by Reddit user r/curious_refuge, for a version of The Lord of The Rings. The “new film” was cast with all new “actors,” and done in the style of Grand Budapest Hotel director Wes Anderson.

User @mrgreen first posted the video to Twitter:

The Lord of the Rings by Wes Anderson. The casting is perfect! Featuring:
– Bill Murray as Gandlaf
– Jeff Goldblum as Elrond
– Willam Dafoe as Gollum
– Owen Wilson as Sauron.

Others followed suit, using AI software to edit any number of other films and bits of media to look like Wes Anderson pieces.

Twitter user @shujio made this one:

If Harry Potter was made by Wes Anderson

Likewise, user @cha did this one:

#NCT127 hit the states but make it wes anderson

There are many proponents of AI software out there, with the most common pro argument being that AI “allows everyone to be creative,” even those who might not have the skill set or resources to make a full-blown production.

While this point is technically true, there are others who argue that people are using AI in place of an actual art or film education, and as a result the creative work they are creating is often incredibly derivative of works that already exist.

@ChrisShehanArt said:

AI is great because it lets EVERYONE be creative.
Everyone: Wes Anderson lord of the rings, Wes Anderson Star Wars, what if Wednesday Addams was willem dafoe, blonde girl astronaut, blonde girl astronaut, blonde girl astronaut, blonde girl elf, Wes Anderson Anderson, what if

Related: Inside the Writers Strike Bringing Hollywood to a Halt

There’s also a larger issue at play here, which is that most film buffs feel even the most creative or aesthetically pleasing AI prompt cannot capture the heart of what makes a film by someone like Wes Anderson special.

Wes Anderson films are charming because they seem like a film that might have been made by a bunch of friends – his casts tend to have excellent chemistry, his characters speak in a unique manner, and his sets look so much like stages that a similar look would be easy enough to recreate no matter where you are.

Film, in general, is about a group of people with a shared vision who all come together to make something great. If you take away the process of actually Creating The Film, you lose a lot of the heart behind it, as well as the chance for others who are working with you to provide input to make it better. You lose the intentionality of your decisions, because a computer is making them for you.

@Sirachachau argued:

Could pull off these Wes Anderson parodies back in the early aughts, folks would be charmed by you wrangling some buddies and some DIY production value together, that went over big. Been 20 years since and it’s the exact same joke over and over but done as a creepy tech demo

 

Some, however, argue that AI can be a tool for legitimate learning – after all, don’t most film students learn by watching and trying to incorporate the methods great directors into their work? Learning to prompt an AI to give you exactly what you want is, after all, a skill in its own right.

This circles back to the main issue the public has with AI art at the moment – since many AI bots were trained using the work of art that already exist (including some from authors who didn’t consent to having their art used), there is a large camp who say that people who use are just piggybacking off of the skills that they worked so hard to build.

Even of those who believe AI can be valuable, there are many who seem to be uncomfortable with the way it’s currently being used.

User @mr_flaneur made the point:

i guess i’ll be that guy – but can we stop referencing artists – and especially Wes? and learn how to tame this to be a tool that serves us rather than be 100% derivative? \_(ツ)_/¯

To which @lukaslutzAI replied:

Haha I like the last sentence! There‘s a sad truth behind this. But on the other hand I don‘t think we‘ll become useless, I think it just changes the way we work. Surely by just copying you won‘t learn much. But from my exper. this space loves to tweak and change to learn more.

Related: ‘Game of Thrones’ Creator Shuts Down Spinoff to Support Writer’s Strike

 

Those who are proponents of the new learning tool, and who were not in creative industries before, may be missing some context for why artists and creatives feel so threatened by this encroachment on their field.

Aesthetic development  is just one part of the creation of a film, and while it’s often one of the easiest ways to identify a particular director’s style, those aesthetics are usually an extension of the ethos behind their work, rather than the main point of it.

Directors don’t often set out to have a signature style on purpose. Rather, that style develops over time as a result of choices that they make over and over again; details as small as a favorite color, a style of clothing, or even a preference for short, quippy dialogue are usually found along the creative journey of becoming a director.

People who don’t make or study film often don’t fully understand this process, and they shouldn’t be expected to; it is, quite literally, not their job.  Those people may not understand what everyone is so upset about; from their perspective, AI is just a fun, novelty tool.

However, the unfortunate truth is that there are people whose job it IS who don’t fully understand the filmmaking process either, and those people are sometimes the ones in charge of making the business decisions.

As AI grows more advanced and more accessible, many people who hire creatives – be they writers, editors, artists, etc. – will be looking to use it to replace humans, as a cost-cutting measure. We’re already seeing this play out, as it was one of the main catalysts for the WGA Writers’ Strike.

The WGA asked studio heads to vow that no concept for a show could be AI generated, and that bots could not write or rewrite scripts – thus protecting the writers’ role in the creative process. Studio heads countered with a hollow offer to have a once-a-year meeting to “discuss advancements in technology.”

If writers are replaced with robots, it will inevitably result in a steep decline in the quality of the work, because as impressive a tool as it is, Artificial Intelligence cannot replace the value of actual human creativity.

Related: Bob Iger Is “Bullish” On AI, But Recognizes It Can Be “Disruptive”

Anderson and Tolkien both value human connection above all else – all of their pieces share a common thread that we are often held together by the sense of love and duty we feel for one another as people. When you use AI to recreate their works, you strip away the very element they valued most from the things they made.

When you get down to the base of the argument, it’s really very simple:

Art exists as a means of human expression, and that is why it is valuable. Until the way it operates balances out so that the human is the one doing most of the work, and until there are regulations around how businesses can use it, it will continue to be a point of contention, and a threat to artists everywhere.

in Entertainment, Technology

Melanie Weir

Melanie Weir has been a professional writer for five years, and has been writing Entertainment news for three of those. She's especially passionate about Disney, Theatre, and sitcoms. When she's not writing or re-analyzing her favorite media, you can find her co-hosting 'Made You Watch...(a podcast)' with her former coworker Adam Mock. You can also see her act in the the award-winning YouTube series 'Please Help' from Enstarz Media, which she co-wrote.

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