Tilly Nollywood? African filmmakers - ready or not - prepare for the AI revolution
The world premiere of the film, billed as the first photorealistic, AI-generated feature film in the Yoruba language, ended last week when demand overwhelmed the servers of Docuth, the streaming platform that hosted the launch. After months of hype for the release of “Asiri Ilu Awon Osu” (The Mystery of Osu Land), […]
The world premiere of the film, billed as the first photorealistic, artificial intelligence-generated feature film in the Yoruba language, ended last week when demand overwhelmed the servers of Docuth, the streaming platform that hosted the launch.
After months of hype for the release of "Asiri Ilu Awon Osu" (Mystery of Osu Land), the Nigerian producers of the film, Mysterious Tech Studios, took to social media to apologize for the glitch, telling their followers, "To all those who tried to watch at home and abroad and couldn't get through, please don't be offended or discouraged." Related Stories Amazon's Viking drama 'Bloodaxe' sets release date, teases intense new trailer at New York Comic Con
The episode seems somewhat emblematic of this moment in the history of artificial intelligence in Africa, where excitement about the technology's transformative potential for filmmakers on the continent is often at odds with practical realities on the ground. Popular in Variety
As African industry professionals gathered at this year's Durban FilmMart, both the potential and pitfalls of artificial intelligence were on the agenda.
Among the main concerns of many stakeholders are barriers to entry. AI tools that are widely available elsewhere in the world face unique challenges in reaching African consumers, from high data costs and slow bandwidth speeds to payment processing.
Tamara Dawit, of Canadian-Ethiopian production company Gobbs Media, noted that these challenges represent significant "systemic barriers" to the adoption of the latest technology tools on the African continent.
"How do we address these issues so that everyone benefits from technological advances?" he said "If these are great opportunities for the industry, can everyone really access them?"
Zukisani Karabo Mabece, of media technology and production company Digicine Motion Picture, agreed.
"AI isn't necessarily a magic pill," says Mabece, whose Johannesburg-based company builds on generative AI with a suite of digital tools designed to democratize access to cutting-edge technology for African filmmakers.
"It's very biased. It's very Western," he said. We have to build our own language models to build the languages we have here locally. We took it upon ourselves to build models that serve our market and geography."
In some cases, the rapid adoption of AI technology has had unintended consequences that are not unique to Africa.
Earlier this year, the South African government drafted an ambitious AI policy that was summarily withdrawn when journalists discovered that at least six of its 67 academic citations were the by-product of AI illusions, referring to journals and authors that did not exist. The drafters seem to have used broad language to set up the policy without validating its claims.
While the mistake was a public relations disaster for South African policymakers, Amilkar Patel, who serves as co-chairman of the South African Federation of Screeners (SASFED), noted that there are more destructive risks lurking in Africans' use of AI tools developed in the global north.
"We have to be very careful when we use AI in our work, especially in our policymaking and our legal work, because we're instilling in our legal framework a very different culture that doesn't protect women, doesn't protect the poor and the vulnerable," Patel says. "And then it becomes law."
For African creatives, there are other ethical factors to consider.
"Artificial intelligence is a mirror of society," Davitt said. Society has many systemic inequalities within itself and these inequalities show themselves [in artificial intelligence models].
Samantha Kane, of the Independent Media Producers Assn, added: "People who build AI are not like us. Biases are already built into AI systems." Creative Talents (I.M.P.A.C.T.). When mainstream AI models are trained primarily on Western data and Western culture, what is the point of using these tools without aesthetically importing others or erasing one's own identity?”
Such concerns are likely to be on the agenda next month, when Cape Town hosts the Africa AI Summit, a three-day event that will bring together state and global business and technology leaders to map out a roadmap that will shape the future of AI across Africa and the Global South.
Supported by partners including the World Bank, Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Nvidia, the event is built around a billion-dollar AI initiative designed to accelerate the deployment of AI across the continent.
In the meantime, African filmmakers will continue to find uses for AI tools, even as the continent's digital infrastructure and policy frameworks are forced to use AI tools.
A week after the failed launch of "Mystery of Osu Land," Mysterious Tech Studio's Kafilat Yusuff told Variety that the platform "has now stabilized" after viewers experienced intermittent access due to heavy traffic at launch. The film, which features approximately 80 percent AI-assisted scenes and 20 percent live-action scenes using real actors and their voices, is now available to stream on Docuth.
"Our experience has shown us that AI offers independent African filmmakers new ways to explore ambitious stories and visual worlds," said Yusuf. However, it also raises important questions about the role of human actors, consent, compensation, creative ownership, and how AI-assisted films are received by audiences.
As for future plans, he said the company will hold off on pursuing until Master Osoland has had a chance to enjoy a "full run."
"We've spent a lot of time building this, and with the initial traffic we've just seen on Docuth, it's clear that there's a lot of global curiosity. So our focus right now is festivals, wider press and ensuring sustained global streaming so that everyone who wants to see it can see it.
We are documenting everything we learned from this 80% AI-20% live action hybrid pipeline, which will ultimately help us and other African filmmakers make future projects at a lower cost.
Durban FilmMart takes place from October 9-12 in Durban, South Africa.