Ashton Kutcher is getting roasted for his comments about using AI to make feature films in their entirety

That ’70s Show and The Butterfly Effect star Ashton Kutcher is making waves online after commenting on the advances of AI and using the tools to create entire feature films with generative assets. Speaking with Google CEO Eric Schmidt at L.A.’s Berggruen Salon, Kutcher went to bat for Sora, OpenAi’s generative video tool. Kutcher is a significant fan of the program and thinks the possibilities it presents are limitless. He details the cost-cutting aspects of using AI, saying shots that would typically cost someone thousands could cost significantly less with the use of AI. He’s not wrong, but what is the cost to creators and crew members?

“You can create good 10, 15-second videos that look very real,” Kutcher said. “It still makes mistakes. It still doesn’t quite understand physics. … But if you look at the generation of this that existed one year ago as compared to Sora, it’s leaps and bounds. In fact, there’s footage in it that I would say you could easily use in a major motion picture or a television show.”

“Why would you go out and shoot an establishing shot of a house in a television show when you could just create the establishing shot for $100?” he continued at the salon, which was touted as a discussion about how “technology is disrupting the film industry and changing the way creativity is approached.”

“To go out and shoot it would cost you thousands of dollars,” Kutcher continued. “Action scenes of me jumping off of this building, you don’t have to have a stunt person go do it, you could just go do it [with AI].”

Kutcher dug his hole deeper when he began talking about using AI to create entire films from scratch, essentially discounting the hard work of industry staff by saying anyone would “be able to render a whole movie. You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie. Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

Unfortunately for Kutcher, former Rick and Morty writer Caite Delaney quickly called him out on social media, saying his way of thinking short-changes below-the-line workers. Delaney publically told Kutcher you’re “cannibalizing your own industry because you played Steve Jobs in an inferior movie and think you’re a tech genius now.”

“When you take ANY humans off of a collaborative and creative pursuit you literally lose the humanity,” she continued. “A hollow, dumbass, pointless shell. TV will have the same artistic merit as dish soap,” Delaney continued.

Delaney’s comments were the first dominos to fall in an avalanche of observations concerning Kutcher’s stance on AI.

“Imagine being Ashton Kutcher stepping onto a film set now, after coming out and advocating for all those crew people to lose their jobs and fucking starve,” added screenwriter J. Filiatraut. “Gutsy choice, bud.”

“I overhear it at my bar, hedgefund bros & stocks. Departments in my girl’s corporate job. Celebrities like Ashton Kutcher,” wrote Ash Laser on Twitter. “It’s such an ignorant, shortsighted, self-centered, short-term cost vs long-term gain mindset. You’re training it to replace YOU. And your kid’s dreams.”

Woof! I doubt Kutcher anticipated this kind of response to his interview. AI could have a place in Hollywood, but it’s a double-edged sword. You’re barking up the wrong tree once you start talking about replacing flesh-and-blood workers. We could strike a balance with AI one day, but it’s not today or anytime soon.

What do you think of Ashton Kutcher’s comments about AI? Would you watch a film made by artificial intelligence? Let us know in the comments below.