by James Fletcher
Often perceived as a backhanded blessing, the expression ‘May you live in interesting times’ seems an apt description of the current state of filmmaking. From the predatory practices employed by streamers to the evisceration of production and exhibition at the hands of Covid restrictions to the post-pandemic strikes and constant reports of conflict between studios and creatives, it is indeed, interesting times for the industry.
However, with the dust hopefully beginning to settle on the new Hollywood, public perceptions of certain industry practices – inflated budgets, shelving of produced films, sell-offs, mergers – are dragged into the glaring arena of the internet, are beginning to reconcile from the divisive tête-à-têtes to the status quo. One of the more vocal conversations, driven by the longevity of the SAG-AFTRA strike, has been that surrounding Artificial Intelligence, and its viability for abuse and exploitation, which has already taken hold across certain web communities.
But, like all emerging technology, those who can harness the new medium for creative effect will temper the storm of opinion. One such filmmaker embracing the AI revolution is Hooroo Jackson, who is embracing the new tech to circumnavigate traditional film production restrictions, successfully generating a feature length animated film DreadClub: Vampire’s Verdict.
Running at just under ninety minutes, Jackson, credited as the film’s writer, director and producer, completed the project in six months, generating over 17,000 still images, for a total budget of US$650 with all visuals, animation, performances, sounds and music generated by A.I.
Inspired by films such as The Count of Monte Cristo, Total Recall, Ghostbusters, Studio Ghibli, edgy ‘90s romcoms, Hey Arnold, Speed Racer, and Saturday morning cartoons; Jackson has described his film as ‘Twilight directed by David Cronenberg’.
However, while DreadClub does invite numerous callbacks to past genres and influences, the film succeeds as its own strangely compelling neo-gothic dramedy. The eclectic fluidity of movement, and vocal pacing of the characters expand on the typical 10 second bites you’d find littering TikTok and Instagram, allowing for a true immersive and entertaining experience, further complimented by Jackson’s narrative style. Part gothic romance, courtroom drama and historical mystery, DreadClub embraces a quirky, surrealist vibe celebrating serial anime of the 1980s and ‘90s. But the most surprising aspect of the machine generated film is perhaps the comedy aspects that shine through, not via slapstick or physicality, but thanks to nuanced performances from the film’s supporting cast and its peculiar narrative beats.
With DreadClub: Vampire’s Verdict going live August 16, we spoke with Hooroo Jackson about the challenges and benefits of utilising AI technology creatively and the new path forward for filmmakers who simply want to create movies.
You’re no stranger to traditional filmmaking, and the obvious challenges of working in the studio system. Can you explain what it was about A.I. that caught your interest as a means of longform filmmaking?
“I had begun in traditional film, with 2015’s Aimy in a Cage, so I have been pursuing filmmaking for a decade now. Aimy was my big debut as a 20-something and had Hollywood celebrities in it like Crispin Glover and Allisyn Snyder. There is not one bit of CGI in that movie, it was done entirely traditionally.
“After Aimy, I had one bad experience after another in Hollywood. I sprang out into AI as a matter of necessity. False starts, films that blew up over producer disagreements. Then around 2019, I partnered with screenwriter Vincent Kane and we wrote two starring vehicles for Crispin [Glover], including a legal thriller that was greenlit, where he played an autistic man on trial for murder. But once again, it was a false start.
“In a sense, what was driving me was that I didn’t want these eight years of struggling in Hollywood to be meaningless. I read horror stories about producers or writers who had spent decades trying to make a film only to end up in production hell.
“I took to AI almost immediately. I wanted to show the world that I really did belong as a director, that Aimy wasn’t just a fluke.
“Even the rudimentary 2023 AI technology, to me was like a dream — after eight years, I suddenly was there making a movie with a hundred-dollar budget. That is all I cared about.
“It was a very rudimentary, machine generated movie, called Window Seat, but it was, at the time, historic, because it was the first AI feature film ever made.”
I understand Window Seat wasn’t received with much enthusiasm and drew some criticism online. Can you share your personal insights on how you dissected that negative feedback and found a positive pathway forward? Or even a general perspective on dealing with online vitriol as a creative.
“I stand by Window Seat because it is both surreal and futuristic, while at the same time carrying this black and white ‘90s Sundance indie aesthetic. But I got tired of explaining to people over and over that it’s the first AI movie, that AI will never look like that film ever again, that it’s in fact the worst AI will ever look.
“In the end, I took one for the team with the film. That movie was made relatively quickly, only three weeks. I did it just to show people that it was possible.
“Still, there is no doubt that the movie was not received how I intended, and it made me take my new movie, DreadClub: Vampire’s Verdict, extremely seriously. I felt that I had something to prove. I knew I had to come up big.
DreadClub took six full months to make, and in the process, the haters were louder than ever before. These haters were mostly CG artists, animators, and blender artists, threatened by someone making an AI animated film. My goal was to show an exciting future that is in front of us, a future that anyone can make a film with no limitations.
“I am not used to facing that level of antagonism, but I will take it any day over the alternative. Because in the end, the film came out better than I dreamed it would. As it was the first AI animated film, I worked really hard to set a high standard out the gate.”
Using AI seems like it would a minefield of random course-corrections and unexpected tangents, both narratively and visually. How was the experience and how difficult is it to maintain a coherent story structure and character arc?
“It was far crazier to work with this technology than the spring of ‘23 when I began. It was like working with wild horses. You can get a split second of usable footage and then it all breaks away. Characters run in and out of the shot. Faces morph or sometimes heads roll off the body. This happens so many times; at one point in Window Seat, a character’s body cuts in half mid-shot, and I kept it in the film, adding a samurai slice sound to go with it.
“It is another reason I worked so hard on DreadClub. I felt I had gotten away with a lot of things on Window Seat, that I shouldn’t have gotten away with. The critics were sort of forced to give it a good review because it was the first, so I wanted to really earn it this time.
“The production on this new film was far less chaotic. AI has already come a long way since 2023, especially the visual technology. I could achieve some really complex shots that were impossible even two months ago, like a girl climbing up the ceiling and swinging back and forth on a chandelier.
One of the most surprising things for me was the humour and how the music helped drive the narrative. Were these aspects of the film intentional, and how did you manage to control, or harness these nuanced moments?
“Probably the funniest character in the movie is the AI character, Jamboree. This character is a computer software that is a cross between being totally useless, while also doing things like giving you free money and hacking into Apple right when you need it, not without first going: ‘Very illegal, Friendzilla’. Jamboree, with his thick Japanese accent, is one of the highlights of the movie.
“Since I workshopped so much of the movie with LLMs (Large Language Models), I also gave the AI a chance to write funny lines for itself.
“Another funny element of the movie is the vampire family attorney, Triswald, a real eccentric because he spent several centuries locked away in a coffin. In filmmaking, you sometimes have an element no one could ever plan for, and suddenly, that one element is dominating the screen, stealing every single scene he’s in. That character of Triswald was so surprising that I kept all his lines in a separate folder as if I was holding onto an Academy Award level performance or something. When I watch the film with people, they all get excited when he starts talking.”
The music is entirely AI generated.
“A part of me felt bad because I work closely with several composers, and we had these conversations where I could sense their fear in real time, as we slowly realised that I would be using AI music. I just didn’t have the budget otherwise.
“With that said, these composers are optimistic about using AI in the future. I always tell people who are uncomfortable about AI, to start playing with it. It is only going to raise the standard in the end, it will give anyone the ability to make good films, and it will give great filmmakers the ability to make even greater ones than they ever thought possible.”
On the technical side, can you explain the AI you used in producing DreadClub, and offer some insights into how you approached and created the film? Does the process allow for story revision or scene changes after it’s generated? Are there any unique challenges that would surprise someone working with traditional storytelling devices?
“Oh yes, as I mentioned, entire characters, like Triswald, weren’t in the movie until after the first assembly. That character was just a regular boring defence attorney, and suddenly he became this flamboyant character that steals the show.
“One of the advantages to AI is that you can rewrite any area of the production at any point. I could even go in right now and add things. I do like the idea in art of having a hard finish though and representing a moment in time.
“The film was generated one still image at a time utilising MidJourney. It was generated one line of audio at a time using machine performances. When I had a rough cut with visuals and performance, I added the music, and animated the film last, using Pika Labs.
“The end result is the first 100 % AI movie with all sound, music, visuals, and performance AI generated. The best thing I can say about DreadClub though, is that people can enjoy it without having any idea that it was AI. You really just get into this whole vampire mystery, and this love story between Betty and Duchamps.”
What was the most surprising aspect of the final film for you personally?
“For being a film that is made entirely solo, the most surprising thing to me is how social of an experience that it was. All the characters felt like real people.
“Aimy in a Cage was an ensemble with twenty actors, and a crew of thirty. DreadClub is a cast and crew of just me.
“In both cases, when a film is over, it’s over. Saying goodbye to real people who will stay with you forever, vs saying bye to 100 % imaginary machine people, carries similar emotions.
“I go back and forth between whether this is a beautiful thing, or whether it’s straight out of Black Mirror. Even I don’t know. Mind you, it is really not that surprising when you consider the solo process of writing novels. It’s just jarring for films because it is so new.”
The film really pays homage to numerous ‘80s and ‘90s anime styles in the best way possible. What were your influences regarding the visuals and storyline for DreadClub and can you describe specific character creation?
“People were nudging me to do a CG Pixar style, which I plan to tackle next, but that wasn’t possible at the time of DreadClub. It’s only now becoming possible with recent developments in AI.
“However, making a vintage anime style film was always one of my dreams. Like a lot of people, I prefer the ‘80s or ‘90s anime hand drawn aesthetic to the modern 3D style. There is something gritty and tactile about it.
“The visual design of the characters was constantly surprising. The protagonist of Betty Gray, I was most excited about, with her leather jacket and wavy hair style. Yet her personality is so sweet and innocent, there is a contrast to who she is and how she looks that is always interesting.
“Characters like Emril De Ve, the long-suffering vampire was difficult to generate. I really wasn’t sure if I got him, and I had doubts even as I finalised him. Then he ended up working perfectly with his thick Eastern European voice and drooping eyes. Like a live action actor, the doubts washed away, and he made the character his own.
“Jamboree was also a process. How should an AI software look on screen? I decided to go with the silliest solution, giving him wide googly eyes with a delirious grin. It almost didn’t matter how he looks because the Japanese voice is going to make it funny.”
For those looking into using AI as a film medium, are there any legal, copyright issues you think new players in the genre should know about? Do you actually own the film? Or is there some grey unspecified ambiguity surrounding its creation?
“I believe since the film asserts its copyright like any other film, it becomes legitimate. However, this is such a new grey area that no one has any idea. Could Hayao Miyazaki come out and say the film utilises the Ghibli style, so they own it? This is all a grey area. I will say that as all of the legalities are ironed out, my hope is that AI can continue. Because right now, it is showing us a very real path to a true independent film movement. In fact, it was my hope from the start that I could show people that it’s possible, and then the floodgates would open.
“There is a debate surrounding AI where people say that AI filmmaking isn’t real filmmaking. However, for an actual director on a live action set, you are having collaborators, actors, designers, handling what you need. None of it is coming from you. So, what difference does it make if these collaborators are machines? This goes back to my original Hollywood experiences. The options weren’t, a five million dollar animated film vs. an AI animated film. The options were, no film or an AI animated film.
“That is the actual dilemma for AI filmmakers. The industry gatekeepers have not only shut out independent filmmakers, but they have also shut themselves in the room in the process, and now they can’t get out, while the rest of us are free. I just can’t see how that is a bad thing.”
