After the Amazon MGM Studios Fiasco, Critics Endorse "Mercy" (and Studio Battles Over Talent Around AI Have Just Begun)
"Mercy" Looks Like the Real Thing: Luca Guadagnino's Genre Hybrid on AI Villainy (and One of Its Fathers, Sam Altman) Premiered Sunday at the London Film Festival in the U.K. The Director, Flanked by Lead Actors Andrew Garfield and Yura Borisov, Was Cheered in the Royal Festival Hall. […]
"Artificial" sounds like something real.
Luca Guadagnino's genre-blending film about the evils of artificial intelligence (and one of its fathers, Sam Altman) premiered at the London Film Festival in the UK on Sunday. Standing alongside co-stars Andrew Garfield and Yura Borisov, the director received a standing ovation in the Royal Festival Hall.
The British event follows the world premiere of "Artificial" a week earlier at the New York Film Festival. It was a make-or-break moment for the project, which was mired in scandal after Amazon MGM pulled the film from its summer slate. Even worse was what came next: a hate-mongering campaign that the film stinks (according to a July report, anonymous sources dismissed it as only worthy of a streaming release). But the big apple swallowed the film with excitement. Related Stories Peacock app launches 'Your Bravoverse', a personalized TikTok-style video feed hosted by AI-produced Andy Cohen.
Variety's senior critic Owen Gleiberman wrote in his review, "So this is a story of the dawn of a new world, as well as a corporate business story, as well as a horror movie in which artificial intelligence emerges from a laboratory as a sinister snake." Popular in Variety
Others agree. The title holds a 96% fresh score on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, marking the highest score of Guadagnino's career worldwide. 11 Feature Films According to another review, Garfield is up for Best Supporting Actor thanks to a performance that delivers "a master class in diabolical evil."
The announcements, the standing ovations, the buzz of the awards — it all represents a stunning turnaround in Guadagnino's fortunes since Amazon's June debacle. In Hollywood terms, it would be highly unusual for even a tech-owned content studio to destroy a project that had been in its infancy. Neon salvaged the film with a worldwide rights deal shortly after the Amazon split.
The e-commerce giant said at the time: "We believe that 'Artificial' would be better served if released by another studio." The global press was almost unanimous in noting that the decision to shelve the film came just three months after Amazon signed a significant partnership with Altman's OpenAI (which included a $50 billion investment in the company).
But, according to Variety's sources, the writing is on the wall. There was no problem with "artificial," and the response underscores the dubiousness of Amazon's decision to leave it out.
"Wasn't that supposed to be awful?" A film executive at a rival studio wondered. The executive was not only at Amazon MGM, but also at other longtime distributors that were in the mix for the project before Neon won. It gives you a reaction this intense, any studio that pretends the movie is unplayable is only contradicting their own investments in AI."
In July, New York magazine published a piece that quoted people close to the project as saying it was "without theatrical standards." It doesn't quite match the audience's initial reaction. Indeed, the critical consensus is that "Artificial" — not Aaron Sorkin's "Social Reckoning," which came out last weekend via Sony Pictures — is a worthy spiritual successor to David Fincher's "The Social Network." It's hard to imagine Amazon not being happy with this response if they kept it "artificial".
Interestingly, Amazon's headaches at the intersection of talent and artificial intelligence are not unique to Guadagnino's film. Last week at New York Comic-Con, actor Nicolas Cage made waves when he revealed that he refused to sign a document that would allow the studio to use artificial intelligence in and around his likeness in its canceled original series "Spider-Noir."
I'm not an AI-loving actor. I am not a member of their club. Cage said: I did not sign the waiver. I probably won't work with that studio again. People close to "Spider-Noir" said there is a little more to the story. Cage was referring to the show's producer, Sony Pictures Television, as the "industry standard" for filming content. A waiver allows the studio to create a duplicate of an actor in costume, which helps VFX work over time. After production, actors are free to opt out, and the form is said to comply with SAG-AFTRA guidelines.
But that won't be the end of the talent boom in the coming AI revolution—at Amazon or elsewhere. A member of the creative team at MGM's Amazon series tells Variety that AI training is a necessity these days.
The source described a "mandatory, unsanctioned meeting" with the company's AI team as standard workplace training that companies regularly hold on sexual harassment and fire safety. The AI team spent an hour presenting the creations on a set of products they referred to as "tools". However, it turns out these tools can eliminate "whole jobs" in manufacturing, our source says. Amazon MGM declined to comment on the matter.
According to the source, more importantly, the flight attendants of Amazon also participated in this training course. While Fred wouldn't name the executives present, they noted that it would be a total shame for everyone, including Amazon, to do so. A source with direct knowledge of Amazon's process said such meetings are not mandatory, and humans drive every part of the process involving tools.
And so begins the great sacrifice that major studios are willing to make in the service of computer-based cost optimization and the "move fast and screw things up" audacity in Silicon Valley. Time will tell if a query can produce content that is as busy and well-positioned as "artificial".