David Cronenberg Calls AI Backlash Against THE BRUTALIST a “Smear Campaign” Says Directors “Mess with Actors’ Voices All The Time"
I’m sure you've heard the noise swirling around director Brady Corbet’sThe Brutalist regarding the use of AI to help polish accents in the film’s Hungarian dialogue. Director David Cronenberg recently shared his thoughts on the matter and he thinks the whole thing was a “smear campaign.”
Speaking at the London Soundtrack Festival in a panel with his longtime composer Howard Shore, Cronenberg jumped to The Brutalist’s defense, saying:
“I must confess, there was a scandal [with] The Brutalist. There was a discussion about Adrien Brody… but apparently they used artificial intelligence to improve his accent. I think it was a campaign against The Brutalist by some other Oscar nominees. It’s very much a Harvey Weinstein kind of thing, though he wasn’t around.”
Cronenberg went on to share his firsthand experience with manipulating audio in post-production. As he put it, these techniques aren’t new, just more efficient with today’s tools. This is somthing that director’s do all of the time.
“Directors mess with actors’ voices all the time,” he said, pointing to John Lone’s performance in his 1993 film M. Butterfly. “When he was being this character, this singer, I raised the pitch of his voice and when he’s revealed as a man, I lowered to his natural voice. This is just a part of moviemaking.”
Editor Dávid Jancsó shared that AI tools from Ukrainian company Respeecher were used during post-production, not to change performances, but to fine-tune the Hungarian language, which is difficult to pronounce accurately.
Jancsó told Red Shark News: “It is controversial in the industry to talk about AI, but it shouldn’t be. We should be having a very open discussion about what tools AI can provide us with.
“There’s nothing in the film using AI that hasn’t been done before. It just makes the process a lot faster. We use AI to create these tiny little details that we didn’t have the money or the time to shoot.”
Director Brady Corbet later added further clarification, saying: “Adrien and Felicity’s performances are completely their own. They worked for months with dialect coach Tanera Marshall to perfect their accents.
“Innovative Respeecher technology was used in Hungarian language dialogue editing only, specifically to refine certain vowels and letters for accuracy. No English language was changed. This was a manual process, done by our sound team and Respeecher in post-production.
“The aim was to preserve the authenticity of Adrien and Felicity’s performances in another language, not to replace or alter them and done with the utmost respect for the craft.”
According to Cronenberg, all of this is less about ethics and more about politics. He sees it as part of the game. "Just a part of moviemaking," as he puts it.
One thing's for sure, AI isn't going anywhere. And neither, it seems, is the drama surrounding it.
Via: Variety