Legendary Hollywood Director Dragged For Partnering With AI Company

Legendary director Martin Scorsese is getting mixed reviews online for his decision to team up with and promote Black Forest Labs, an AI company focused on building visual intelligence.

The company just released a promotional video featuring the 83-year-old Hollywood mainstay discussing how AI can be used in the movie-making process. 

The video shows Scorsese using an AI model to help storyboard a scene for “GoodFellas.” The promo shows him discussing how each moment of the scene featuring mobster Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) going through the Copacabana nightclub had to be staged, and said AI would have made the whole process smoother.

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“If you have a tool like this, you could figure it out much, much quicker and you could save production time, and also less wear and tear on the crew,” Scorsese said in the video.

Scorsese is officially an advisor for Black Forest Labs. It has not been confirmed whether he has a financial stake in the company. 

“Cinema is a young medium, only around 125 years old, so we have to be open to how it can evolve,” Scorsese said in a statement posted on Black Forest Labs’ website. “I utilized 3D with ‘Hugo’ and de-aging technology for ‘The Irishman.’ Now, with this tool, I can share what I’m visualizing more clearly and efficiently to my creative team — the production designer, art designer, and cinematographer — for them to build on to enrich cinematic intelligence.”

He echoed these sentiments in a statement provided to The New York Times on the topic, saying, “I’m interested in the intersection of technology and storytelling, and seeing how that can push the bounds of creativity to create deeper and richer experiences for audiences.”

Commenters were divided on whether the promo release was a dig at creatives who had worked for Scorsese in the past, or was simply an inevitable part of the future of entertainment. 

“The storyboarding part doesn’t bother me at all. The whole point of storyboarding has always been to help other people see what’s in the director’s head. If AI can help someone like Scorsese show his cinematographer or production team what he’s imagining more quickly, I don’t really see the issue,” one person argued. “At that point, it feels less like replacing creativity and more like giving the creative process a better tool.”

“Using AI to visualize ideas is very different from using AI to replace creativity. Interesting perspective from Scorsese,” another X user agreed.

Some storyboard artists were not convinced. Karla Ortiz, a concept artist who worked on multiple Marvel projects, wrote, “He throws every single storyboard artist he’s ever worked with under the bus … To use his legacy and power for this is just so disgusting.”

Samuel Deats, director of animated TV series Castlevania, agreed. He replied, “There is absolutely no reason to need AI built on the stolen work of millions of artists to storyboard your vision, have some damn pride and respect your peers.”