Nickolas Morris

'The Last Screenwriter' is arguably so much more of a social / technological experiment, than it is a cinematic contribution and yet, to the films merit or detriment, the intervention of human artists to help bridge the gap between code and craft helps to make this movie - at the very least - an interesting jumping point for discourse about the role of AI in future creative pursuits. For the avoidance of doubt, I watched this film from a standpoint of pure curiousity and am in no way an advocate for AI, but even though the 72 minute run time is somewhat of an arduous watch, I think people should sample this, to guage what it is this technology - the screenwriter ChatGPT 4.0 - is capable of and what it practically means for the artists of our time. One of the problems with this movie is that because you know it's written by AI, you find yourself scrutinizing and comparing with other movies more stringently than it's human borne counterparts. That's human psychology for you. While it's clear that the screenwriting is (largely) one dimensional, repetitive and rudimentary - relative to what audiences would expect from feature length film - what is less clear is the impact that has on performances, which range from good to questionable. Perhaps the actors are constrained by following bad dialogue and cues verbatim, perhaps it's an artistic desicion to lean into the clunky, robotic script to maximise the uncanniness of the film experiment - perhaps it's just bad acting. Either way, it does not help to pull the wool over your eyes as to AI's involvement in the creative process. One such example is de facto protagonist Jack's reference to his son Alex as 'buddy'. This is a father / son bond, arguably one of the tightest on screen relationships, yet the delivery of this nickname - for whatever reason - does not land as an affectionate human epithet; Rather, in a way that more closely resembles an AI inflection. Ironically - but perhaps not surprisingly - the most believable and fleshed out (no pun intended) character seems to be the story's AI itself. It's cool, calculated and indifferent interactions read as particularly authentic, as the ChatGPT 4.0 beyond the script, seems to walk a careful line between making the AI character grow in its 'villianous' eerie tone to satisfy and placate its human audience, whilst also always being helpful, civil and pragmatic in a self aggrandising way. In retrospect, the story's AI shadiness simply boils down to 'it oversteps the line of human assistance from helpful to assertive', which is on its own relatively tame, but seems to cause the human characters to spin out uncontrollably. The cinematography and the way lighting is captured by the human film crew is a redeeming factor of the movie. It is handled with a sympathy to warmth and romanticism which pulls more than its weight in the humanification of the project. (cont. by Randi Morris))