00:00No, I wanted to start with you because I love that we're getting to speak with you about where
00:11tech and filmmaking can meet given the themes of your film which premieres on the 27th here
00:17at the Eccles. Everyone go see it. Yeah! Your movie which sees a pickpocket having to having
00:28to combine his old school trade up against when he's thrust up against you know this new these new
00:35technologies which is very prescient for this discussion that we're having right now certainly
00:42but I'm wondering for you just to begin with as a longtime member of the indie filmmaking community
00:47how have you seen new technologies and tools improve your and your fellow filmmakers ability
00:54to work outside of the studio system and to get your visions onto the screen?
00:58Well the uh I mean the first job that I had you know was lugging thousand foot magazines of film
01:07from a from a set to the back of a truck where like you know a teenage kid who was probably still
01:19higher drunk from the night before
01:21was tasked with unloading this this gold this like the the movie the movie I had to unload the
01:30movie in the back of a truck in a little thing and not get any light on it and if I did and who's and
01:36if I did that I would not be here today if I had fucked that up I wouldn't like I that's it you like you'll
01:42never work in this town again so I think like you know things have gotten better um and I appreciate
01:48you know and listen I've worked on movies where where we've had you know uh where video files have
01:54been corrupted obviously you know I worked on a movie indie movie where uh we shot on a camera called
02:00the Genesis which was one of the first you know sort of uh um uh uh professional uh uh movie digital
02:07movie cameras um and it got stolen and out of the back of the truck and nobody found nobody found it
02:14so you know I I guess I I say all this just to say that I I think that things have gotten better
02:20in terms of uh probably workflow and accessibility um and definitely on the the level for the the more
02:29indie you are the better it's gotten right because you can afford now to buy great equipment or rent
02:36it or borrow it uh that you couldn't when you know uh I first started um but yeah I think uh it's
02:44definitely changed a lot I mean hungover teenagers make the independent film community go around as
02:50far as I'm concerned Janet I wanted to to throw it to you now you know with the the creators
02:57coalition on AI acknowledges that there is immense business potential with these new technologies
03:02while also advocating for guardrails and shared standards I'm wondering for you personally why did
03:11you join CCAI and and what are the conversations you want to have within the creative and the filmmaking
03:17community about this new technology I'm so inspired by so many things that other people have said
03:24including you know because my first job was uh distributing Chinese cinema and I'd pick up these
03:2935 millimeter prints help me build muscle you know it's crazy and I thought about it in the first film
03:33that I worked on digitally was with Milos Forman and he was just cranky as hell I can't see their eyes
03:40I don't know what's going on and they go why would and then when we finally put it up on the screen
03:45after we converted back he was like oh I get it anyway it's just you know and then thinking about
03:50flatbeds and you know slicing I'm like wow I saw that happen so I can't be anti-technology but
03:59I think we're at a really pivotal moment now my one of my biggest concerns is erosion of trust
04:06what happens to a society when you don't know when something is real or fake and also the aggressive
04:14aggressive nature of the practices of the AI company is just like swiping stealing taking
04:20scraping you know without anybody's permission and I think Dan is totally correct it's because
04:27we're focused on other things and everything's a mess and there's already so much polarization so
04:32that concerns me to the empires that are being built now which will inevitably squash little
04:38people I think there's some really cool technology that I'd like to explore but a lot of those smaller
04:44companies are not going to get the funding because trillions of dollars are going to the big five
04:49seven whatever you know so there are just a lot of really disturbing things about on a macro level
04:55and I think one social isolation the environmental damage these were huge issues before AI became such
05:04a threat and now there it's exacerbated exponentially so it's a lot to think about and I curse and bless
05:13Dan and John for getting me involved in this because it's like I feel like schizophrenic like I want to try
05:19to try it but you know we're really hoping and it's it so goes against the grain of the the the sensibilities
05:35and the temple at which people are working now to say oh slow down can we examine things a little bit
05:42more deeply can we really look at where these learning models got their information can we even define what
05:46artificial intelligence is do we have any kind of agreement about anything and I think this is the
05:53very lofty goals of CCI is to to arrive at certain basic principles that we can agree on and I think we
06:01can because people want to know there is no transparency this is a real offense to humans yesterday after
06:10some of us were on a panel then Chloe Zhao spoke and she was so poetic and so you've probably seen
06:16other talks with her where she talked about her process the creative process she used a lot of dream
06:22therapy on Hamnet and then they played a certain music that Jessie Buckley picked after she you know
06:29did her dream journaling and and setting a vibe this is what AI cannot do it cannot talk about the
06:37different seasons of creativity it cannot talk about mining our ancestral roots you know there's so many
06:44things that are so precious or should be precious to us that are not measurable that are not quantifiable there's no
06:51metrics for this what is joy what is love what is healing what is grief how do we so this obsession with data yes it's very
06:59helpful I wish they would focus on curing cancer or in some environmental problems you know why do they want to invade this
07:07why do they want to invade this industry the creative industries which are so not about that there's just like such a
07:14fundamental misunderstanding or a schism between people who work in the creative fields yesterday this
07:22person Andrew that we were talking to he's there's they have come up with a lot of really interesting narratives about oh it's fair use oh we're doing things that are good for humanity they're just spinning stories and we're not feeling the results and because
07:26Silicon Valley has allowed people to raise trillions of dollars without a proven profitable business plan this just keeps going on so it's just propelling these
07:33industries you know the AI industry to like God knows some people think AI is going to collapse what you know that's going to be disaster for the stock market so it's very confusing and we need to be really clear and level-headed about what we think are should be our priorities and we need to be
07:52you know we're looking at the same elephant some people are so focused on the technology can do this and this and this even though they don't really know where it's going tomorrow but how about thinking about humanity just like basic humanity
08:15going off of that and gearing it more towards the entertainment industry Jane I wanted to stay with you real quick you know what are the most common questions you're hearing from people in the industry or maybe the questions that you have yourself when it comes to incorporating working with this new technology
08:41I think people want to know what can we do now and so the first thing is is to present some again principles it's like can we be in agreement we've already had many conversations with the guilds we're starting with the studios there's a lot there's a lot to say I think we can all agree on this and I think if we have more leverage if we all decide that we are a body of people and that will extend hopefully be well beyond Hollywood to other creative industries and say that
09:11this is what the people this is what the people are demanding it's a it's a grassroots movement I mean there I don't know what else to call it but it is it is that and I think again tools great but let's get let's really define our future
09:32Noah for you going off of going off of that I something that gets brought up a lot and conversations about AI is how it can bring
09:41down costs and obviously in independent filmmaking costs are always at the front of front of mind have you and your fellow filmmakers have you been involved in conversations about and been thinking about you know what what could AI do when it comes to independent filmmaking you know what are the questions that you have around that as a person who is making movies in this space
10:02I don't think that uh I don't think that uh I don't think that uh I don't think that I have had conversations about what AI can do better than what we can do because I don't think that people who are used to doing everything themselves and you know creating their little family and running off and joining the circus think that someone else is going to do it better than them and they're and they're not and there's and there is no you know back to the you know
10:32my first joke it's like there is no margin for error I was talking to you about this before the panel right you know technology I think uh uh by and large has a much higher threshold for failure than successfully uh uh making a movie or a tv show or a record or painting a picture right you know if I tell you that I've got a piece of technology and 90% of the time it does
11:01whatever I say it does it perfectly 90% of the time you might give me like a billion dollars right you might give me like a billion dollars to like if I had it I would yeah that sounds great if I tell you that 10% of the time I screw up horribly at my job I would never work again right like the threshold like it just like that I'm not I I just don't think that it's that it's there yet in terms
11:31of of of being sort of an existential threat because um you know again not to make a joke but it's like they hate us because they ain't us you know what I mean it's like it's like you're you're coming for my shit because my shit is good
11:45your shit sucks that's why you want like you're trying to just like ape my good thing that I'm doing and you're not doing it as well so you know maybe when you come correct then we'll talk you know
11:58but is there a danger that people are going to fall for something that's almost as good those people are stupid well there are a lot of stupid people in the world there are a lot of right and there's also and there's all but there's I think I got to say I think there's always been a lot of bad music there's always been a lot of bad movies that's always like there's always been people who there's been people who make a bad movie learn from it and then make a great movie right so you know I just I sort of feel like you kind of got
12:25to open it up and and sort of accept the accept all the crap so that you know the the good stuff can rise to the top definitely they hate us because they ain't us is just incredible um Janet I wanted to throw to you because you brought up the guilds earlier and I'm wondering you know how do you see these upcoming union contract negotiations as being able to move this conversation forward with what you are trying to do with CCAI I'm hoping we're all
12:55offering some guidance there's been conversations and I'm hoping that there can be again some agreement that this is and and by the way the many the guilds have already made statements Netflix has made statement TV cat has made a statement so there there is a path that's being carved out but each individual guild obviously has to look at their needs you know so it's not going to be the same thing across the board I you know that we if you go on to the website creatorscoalitionai.com
13:25you'll see at this point thousands of signatures so this is and this happened so fast so you know that was already a testament that we're kind of on the right track we have a lot of work to do to look at legal issues technical issues political issues so all of that is the work in front of us again thank you so much for giving me another full-time unpaid job
13:41I didn't think I would be doing this it's so important thank you thank you yeah no so we we need to coordination we need to get together we and I really think this is a good time because I think we're all craving this anyway
13:59there's been so much fractionalization we need to come together this is a perfect time to have a belief again in teamwork and coordination and again human human interaction and finding agreement as opposed to constantly finding disagreement so
14:17I'm really appreciative even though I might be grumpy sometimes
14:36definitely Noah I saw you nodding along there and I am wondering for you as a filmmaker actively working within this current
14:47in this current climate of filmmaking right now what are some of the what are some of the guardrails and the standards that you want to see in order to answer your questions about maybe employing this new technology in the future you know what would you like to see from an organization like CCAI
15:03well I think you know traditionally and I think you know I mean in a boilerplate way people's likeness and appearance tends to be protected I mean that's not controversial right it's not controversial that and and when I say boilerplate I mean that's in our union contracts right I mean we are so the idea that we're having that conversation again gives
15:31seems like again gives seems like again you're trying to be sneaky right like why are you trying to be sneaky like it's just some sneaky shit like that's not real that's not a real thing you can smell something yeah I mean it's it's yeah it seems like you're arguing arguing semantics and you're arguing semantics with people who argue semantics for a living versus people who make shit for a living like semantics doesn't you know semantics for me means something very different
15:59right it means like you know do I like this color does it make me feel a thing like you know it's completely separate from you know a legal framework which is why we have unions and we have lawyers and we have people who we employ to protect us and so I think you know that that gives me quite a pause you know and I think the
16:27from a perspective of young amateur filmmakers and artists who will be the next generation of professional filmmakers and artists the standard has to remain high right so just because you can make something very easy that looks almost as good as does not mean it is as good as
16:57right and so I think with that comes education and simply saying look what what are what are some good movies like what are some great stories like how do we all kind of agree and and and and and I don't know water that you know how do we tend to that garden so that younger people or people who are who are who are up and coming who aren't even at a stage of being professional independent
17:24filmmakers uh filmmakers uh feel like they've got material that they can work with that isn't uh crap isn't slop
17:36uh and I can confidently say having seen it a really great story is the last living pickpocket in New York
17:47wait um and yes and I wish we had more time to keep discussing it but uh we have to keep this evening going but thank you so much for taking the time and sharing everything
17:59thank you
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