Many 2023 movies havepresented artificial intelligence as a villain. Prominent examples includeMission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part OneandHeart of Stone. As a result, these films have been viewed as very timely since many people are scared by how quickly AI is being implemented into industries around the world.
The Creator, directed byRogue One’sGareth Edwards, originally seemed like it was going to be grouped in with the two previously mentioned action films. After all, the teaser trailer for the science fiction film revealed that an AI program dropped a nuclear bomb on Los Angeles. However, as more details aboutThe Creatorhave emerged, it seems like the film may actually adopt a much more sympathetic view of AI.
A War Between AI and Humans
The official trailer forThe Creatorexpands on what was shown in the teaser trailer and further hints that AI may not actually be the villain of this sprawling sci-fi story.
At the start of the trailer, a character named Maya (Gemma Chan) tells Joshua (John David Washington) that robots took “better care of me than humans would” once war broke out. Joshua, steadfast in his beliefs, insists that robots are not human, which is probably why he is selected to end the ongoing warbetween robots and humans.
Joshua is assigned to retrieve a “super weapon” that would greatly help the robots win the war. However, when Joshua discovers this weapon is just a child, he is forced to question his beliefs. The child wants robots to be free, while Joshua’s superiors may wish to use the child to destroy all robots once and for all, which puts him in the middle of the two feuding parties.
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Talking about howhumans and robots are dividedinThe Creator, Edwards told Collider,
“Basically the movie was always like, the world is divided in two. Half the world has banned AI. They hate it. It’s wrong. It caused some real big problems. And the other half of the movie’s embraced it, carried on developing it to the point where it’s now human-like. So it’s kind of an east-versus-west situation at the start.”
Edwards then claimed that every single person who read the screenplay questioned why humans would be against AI. This became such a common criticism that the writer-director actually edited the story so humans had a solid reason to hate AI. However, things have completely changed in the last year now that AI has become much more prevalent in our world.
The War in Hollywood
Edwards pointed out that it is now everyone’s natural reaction to be completely against AI. The concern ofartificial intelligence replacing humansis especially prevalent in the film industry, as actors and writers are currently on strike to ensure that rapidly developing technology will not make their jobs obsolete.
Currently, actors are fighting against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) to have the ability to give informed consent to have their performances train AI systems. As the SAG-AFTRA strike has developed, it has been revealed that studios such as Disney have also previouslyperformed body scans on actorsso that they could use their likeness on future projects. Therefore, if the studio wanted an actor to appear in a movie or television show down the line, they technically would not even have to pay the actor under current rules since they can digitally add them to the scene.
Similarly, writers are standing up against the AMPTP to ban the use of AI to write scripts for movies and television shows. These two Hollywood-centric examples caused Edwards to drastically examine the story he told inThe Creator.
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Speaking with Deadline, the director revealed that one of the hardest parts of writingThe Creatorwas deciding what year it should be set in. Since he believed many of the problems posed in the film wouldn’t be humanity’s concern for many years, he logically set the movie in the year 2070. Delving into theongoing Hollywood strikes, he said, “Now I feel like an idiot because I should have gone for 2023 because everything that’s been unfolding in the last few months is kind of scary and weird.”
Therefore, Edwards clearly knows how much advancing technology has changed his industry over the last year. However, he conceivedThe Creator’sstory before these issues were so threatening, which could dramatically impact the message people take away from the film.
What Does Our Future Look Like?
Do the events of the last few months suggest that humanity is entering into a longtime debate over the use of AI and other emerging technologies? Are we destined to enter into a war with robots, just like the one seen inThe Creator? No matter what you believe the answer to these questions are, it is clear thatThe Creatorwill affect how we view AI.
As mentioned, since Edwards wrote the film long before AI programs threatened the livelihoods of most in his industry, maybeThe Creator’ssympathetic outlook on robots will make people consider whether halting technological advancements is truly the right decision. On the other hand, maybe the more dystopian elements of the film’s story will reinforce people’s belief that we can’t let technology take over our world.
We may have to wait years and years to find out exactly how rapidly advancing technology will affect our day-to-day lives, but thankfully, audiences only have to wait mere weeks to watchThe Creator, which hits theaters on Sept. 29, 2023.
