Guillermo del Toro echoes Hayao Miyazaki in damnation of AI animation
Guillermo del Toro has referred to the legendary Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki whilst discussing animation created by artificial intelligence. Del Toro’s new film Pinocchio was captured entirely using stop-motion animation and was painstakingly filmed in over 1000 days.
“I think that art is an expression of the soul,” del Toro said. “At its best, it is encompassing everything you are. Therefore, I consume, and love, art made by humans. I am completely moved by that. I am not interested in an illustration made by machines and the extrapolation of information.”
He continued: “I talked to Dave McKean, who is a great artist. And he told me, his greatest hope is that AI cannot draw. It can interpolate information, but it cannot draw. It can never capture a feeling, or a countenance, or the softness of a human face, you know? Certainly, if that conversation was being had about film, it would hurt deeply. I would think it, as Miyazaki says, ‘an insult to life itself’.”
Miyazaki made the original comments in a 2016 documentary series about his work. When he was shown an animation of a zombie creature entirely created by artificial intelligence, he responded with disdain and disgust.
“Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever,” he said. “I am utterly disgusted. If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself.”
After Miyazaki was informed that an animator had been trying to invent a machine that draws as well as humans do, he shot back, “I feel like we are nearing to the end of the times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves.” And it looks like del Toro is in agreement with this sentiment too.
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