Movies
Taika Waititi Still Planning to Direct ‘Akira’ Adaptation!
The concept behind Akira doesn’t feel as fresh as it once did and that’s why I was so goddamn excited to have Taika Waititi steering the wheel. The filmmaker behind What We Do in the Shadows, Thor: Ragnarok, and the forthcoming Acadamy Award candidate JoJo Rabbit, has a fresh perspective that beautifully meshes with his visually stunning storytelling. If anyone were to breathe new life into Akira it would be Waititi.
It was soul-crushing to report that Warner Bros. had (once again) pulled the plug on Akira due to a scheduling conflict with Waititi’s Thor: Love and Thunder. It was implied that he could return after Thor, but that seemed highly unlikely, not to mention an obvious pr move by the studio.
It’s been three months now and Waititi isn’t wavering from this position, telling IGN that he still plans to circle back to Akira once he completed his commitment to Marvel’s Thor.
“Unfortunately, the timing with Akira, because we’ve been working really hard on the script, we had to keep pushing the start date for the shoot,” Waititi said. “We ended up having to push it a couple weeks too far, which actually ate into the Thor schedule, because they were very close together. And that got pushed again and again, and it just got too far into the Thor schedule to be able to make it work. And my first commitment was to Marvel to make that film, so now I’ve kind of had to take Akira and sort of shift it around to the tail-end of Thor and move it down a couple of years.”
I’m not wanting to see Akira rushed and if this is what it takes to get it done correctly, I’ll wait. Waititi is an exciting filmmaker and Warner Bros. is doing the right thing to wait on him, assuming his commitment is authentic. For now, at least we have the original animated adaptation as well as Fox’s Chronicle.
In Akira, a secret military project endangers Neo-Tokyo when it turns a biker gang member into a rampaging psychic psychopath that only two teenagers and a group of psychics can stop.
Movies
‘Backrooms’ Director Kane Parsons Is No Fan of Generative AI: “Defeats the Purpose Entirely for Me”
There has been a lot of talk recently about filmmakers embracing generative AI as part of the filmmaking process, from Darren Aronofsky to Martin Scorsese. But what about filmmakers that are against the use of Gen AI for creative pursuits? You can count 20-year-old Backrooms director Kane Parsons among that group, which should give you some hope for the future.
In a new chat with The Australian, the self-taught young filmmaker makes it crystal clear that he won’t be using generative AI in any of his upcoming filmmaking projects.
“I think I’m in the same boat as most well-adjusted people,” Parsons tells the outlet. “If I could snap my fingers and make generative AI disappear forever, I probably would. Creatively, I get no enjoyment from using those tools. It defeats the purpose entirely for me.”
“What interests me more is interrogating it artistically,” Parsons notes. “We already live in a world where you walk outside and there are billboards and signs that are obvious AI slop. That’s become part of our visual reality. To me, generative AI feels less like innovation than a symptom of a broader cultural and economic rot.”
He explains, “I’m interested in using that iconography in art – not using AI to make the art itself, but examining what it represents. I definitely want to explore it further in future projects.”
Kane Parsons also notes during the interview with The Australian, “… there’s so much at stake and so many genuinely harmful consequences already happening.”
Backrooms marks young prodigy Kane Parsons’ feature directorial debut, and it’s based on his own series of YouTube videos that were brought to life using Blender, the open-source 3D computer graphics software suite. So it’s no surprise that Parsons, who has hand-made his filmmaking career up to this point, isn’t buying into the hoopla around Generative AI.
His debut feature is the #1 movie in the world, so perhaps he’s onto something.
What’s next from Kane Parsons, you ask? Stay tuned…
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