Ashton Kutcher under fire for praising AI in movies

Ashton Kutcher is under fire after he praised the use of AI in movies.

The Jobs actor suggested AI could replace the entire cinema industry, with cost savings making it an irresistible prospect.

"You'll be able to render a whole movie," Ashton, 46, told former Google CEO Eric Schmidt during a discussion panel in Los Angeles. "You'll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you'll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie."

He went on to suggest there would be no point in making movies and TV shows the traditional way once AI was fully operational.

"Why would you go out and shoot an establishing shot of a house in a television show when you could just create the establishing shot for $100? To go out and shoot it would cost you thousands of dollars," Ashton queried.

"Action scenes of me jumping off of this building, you don't have to have a stunt person go do it, you could just go do it (with AI)."

Cinema fans were outraged, with a number taking to social media to express their views.

"It's such an ignorant, shortsighted, selfcentered, shortterm cost vs longterm gain mindset. You're training it to replace YOU. And your kid's dreams," one person wrote on X/Twitter.

Another argued stripping out the human element would make movies "hollow".

"When you take ANY humans off of a collaborative and creative pursuit you literally lose the humanity," they wrote. "A hollow, dumba*s, pointless shell. TV will have the same artistic merit as dish soap."