Nigerian filmmaker Akay Mason has said artificial intelligence-generated films cannot replace the emotional depth and connection created by human actors.
Mason made the assertion in a post shared on X on Friday, arguing that AI-generated productions often lack the emotional quality audiences naturally connect with in human performances.
“AI films will fail. Every AI short film I’ve seen lacks the emotional connection we instinctively feel when watching actual humans perform. It just feels empty,” he said.
The filmmaker also linked the appeal of human actors to celebrity culture, noting that audiences often develop strong emotional attachments to stars they admire.
“Another reason is our tendency toward idolatry and celebrity culture. We love to worship our stars. With AI films, there are no stars to worship. You know the character on screen is nothing but a series of codes,” Mason said.
He, however, acknowledged that artificial intelligence has useful applications in filmmaking, particularly for technical and post-production tasks.
According to him, filmmakers can use AI to address issues involving visual effects, lighting and sound.
“Sure, filmmakers now use AI as a tool to fix VFX, lighting, or sound issues, and that’s perfectly okay,” he said, adding that he had also used ChatGPT to correct grammatical errors in his post.
Despite the increasing adoption of AI across the creative industry, Mason maintained that the technology cannot reproduce the essence of a human actor’s performance.
“But if we’re being real, AI actors cannot replace a real actor’s performance, which is, at its core, the expression of the human soul,” he said.
