The filmmakers behind The Brutalista likely Oscar contender currently distributed by A24, used AI to alter the actor’s dialogue and create images used in the film’s epilogue, explained the film’s editor, Dávid Jancsó, in an interview with RedShark News.
The epic drama follows a fictional Hungarian architect (played by Adrien Brody) who struggles to create art within the fickle system of American capitalism (and the weirdos who run it). To make Brody and co-star Felicity Jones’ Hungarian pronunciation as accurate as possible, Jancsó says the production used AI from a company called Respeecher to modify the actor’s speech.
Respeecher was able to adjust the actor’s voice to match the pronunciation of a native Hungarian speaker, although Jancsó says the process didn’t do anything you couldn’t achieve with traditional dialogue editing. “You can do it yourself in ProTools, but we had so much dialogue in Hungarian that we really had to speed up the process, otherwise we would still be in office.”
Generative AI was also used to help create architectural drawings used toward the end of the film, according to Jancsó. Both decisions were made due to the budgetary constraints the production was under. The Brutalist is a three-hour-plus film with multiple stars, period-appropriate costumes, and elaborate sets, reportedly made for less than $10 million.
A little over a year after several Hollywood unions went on strike over the possibility of studios using AI to replace their workers, the use of the technology remains highly controversial, let alone openly at this point. subject. But the problem is undeniably complicated when there are many different ways to use AI. “The goal was to preserve the authenticity of Adrien and Felicity’s performances in another language, not to replace or alter them, and to do so with the greatest respect for the profession,” said Brady Corbet, director of The Brutalistsaid The Hollywood Reporter in a statement.
Respeecher was previously used to create new Darth Vader dialogue for Disney+. Obi-Wan-Kenobi, and it probably won’t be the last time similar tools are used to reduce costs. Making films is resource-intensive, and even as companies attempt to push for AI adoption, using AI tools will likely remain a viable option to save time and money.
