![\"dhanush\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/gettyimages-174384929-594x594-1754503412.jpg\")
Indian Bollywood actor Dhanush attends a party for the Hindi film, Raanjhanaa, in Mumbai on July 24, 2013 [File: STRDEL\/AFP via Getty Images]Is AI-altering legal?<\/p>\nNew Delhi, India \u2013 What if Michael had died instead of Sonny in The Godfather? Or if Rose had shared the debris plank, and Jack hadn\u2019t been left to freeze in the Atlantic in Titanic*?<\/p>\n
Eros International, one of India\u2019s largest production houses, with more than 4,000 films in its catalogue, has decided to explore this sort of what-if scenario. It has re-released one of its major hits, Raanjhanaa, a 2013 romantic drama, in cinemas \u2013 but has used artificial intelligence (AI) to change its tragic end, in which the male lead dies.<\/p>\n
In the AI-altered version, Kundan (played by popular actor Dhanush), a Hindu man who has a doomed romance with a Muslim woman, lives. But the film\u2019s director, Aanand L Rai, is furious.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe idea that our work can be taken and modified by a machine, then dressed up as innovation, is deeply disrespectful,\u201d Rai said, adding that the entire film crew had been kept in the dark about the re-release.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat makes it worse is the complete ease and casualness with which it\u2019s been done,\u201d said Rai. \u201cIt is a reckless takeover that strips the work of its intent, its context, and its soul.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is the first time a film studio has re-released a movie with AI alterations, anywhere in the world, and it has also caused an uproar among critics, filmmakers and film lovers.<\/p>\n
Here is what we know so far about why this move has been so controversial, and what the legal and ethical issues are.<\/p>\n
How has the film been altered?<\/p>\n
Eros International, a prominent film studio, has re-released a Tamil-dubbed version of the film, Raanjhanaa, titled Ambikapathy, with an alternate, AI-generated ending.<\/p>\n
This altered version, which significantly deviates from the original film\u2019s climax, screened at cinemas in Tamil Nadu, a southern Indian state, on August 1.<\/p>\n
At the end of the original movie, the lead male character, Kundan, lies dead, covered in bruises from his injuries, in a hospital with his lover sitting by his side, crying. In the AI-altered ending, however, Kundan does not die. Instead, he opens his eyes and starts to stand up.<\/p>\n
How have people reacted to the re-release?<\/p>\n
The release of the AI-altered version prompted immediate objections from the film\u2019s original creators. Dhanush, a Tamil actor, issued a statement noting that \u201cthis alternate ending stripped the film of its soul\u201d and that the re-release had \u201ccompletely disturbed\u201d him.<\/p>\n
With its changed ending, Ranjhaanna is \u201cnot the film I committed to 12 years ago\u201d, he said. The actor added that the use of AI to alter films \u201cis a deeply concerning precedent for both art and artists [that] threatens the integrity of storytelling and the legacy of cinema\u201d.<\/p>\n
Rai, the director, shared a detailed note on Instagram condemning the move. \u201cLet me say this as clearly as I can: I do not support or endorse the AI-altered version \u2026 It is unauthorised. And whatever it claims to be, it is not the film we intended, or made.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was never just a film to us. It was shaped by human hands, human flaws, and human feeling,\u201d Rai added. \u201cTo cloak a film\u2019s emotional legacy in a synthetic cape without consent is not a creative act. It\u2019s an abject betrayal of everything we built.\u201d<\/p>\n
Richard Allen, professor of film and media art at City University of Hong Kong, said it seems inevitable that AI-altering will become a mainstream method of filmmaking in global film industries.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf producers think they can make more money out of old content by using AI, they will do so,\u201d Allen told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n
Indian Bollywood actor Dhanush attends a party for the Hindi film, Raanjhanaa, in Mumbai on July 24, 2013 [File: STRDEL\/AFP via Getty Images]Is AI-altering legal?<\/p>\n
Rai has said that he is investigating legal options to challenge the re-release of this movie.<\/p>\n
Eros International insists that its actions are perfectly legal, however, and has refused to retract the re-release.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis re-release is not a replacement \u2013 it is a creative reinterpretation, clearly labelled and transparently positioned,\u201d said Pradeep Dwivedi, chief executive of Eros International Media.<\/p>\n
Dwivedi noted that under Indian copyright law, the producer of a film (in this case, Eros International) is deemed its author and primary rights-holder, meaning that the production house is the first owner of copyright for the film.<\/p>\n
He said the film studio is \u201cthe exclusive producer and copyright holder, holds full legal and moral rights\u201d under Indian laws. He described the alternate ending to the movie as \u201ca new emotional lens to today\u2019s audiences\u201d.<\/p>\n
The studio, which has released more than 4,000 movies globally, will \u201cembrace generative AI as the next frontier in responsible storytelling\u201d, Dwivedi said, adding that Eros International is \u201cuniquely positioned to bridge cinematic legacy with future-ready formats\u201d.<\/p>\n
What about the ethics of this?<\/p>\n
Mayank Shekhar, an Indian film critic, said the real issue with AI-altering is one of ethics: doing it without the expressed consent of the creators \u2013 writer, director and actors \u2013 involved.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s left then is simply the legalese of who owns the copyright, or who paid for the product, and is hence the sole producer, and therefore the owner of the work,\u201d Shekhar said. \u201cTechnically, I suppose, or so it seems, what Eros has done isn\u2019t illegal \u2013 it\u2019s certainly unethical.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his statement, Eros International\u2019s Dwivedi said that every era of cinema has faced the clash between \u201cLuddites and Progressives\u201d. He added: \u201cWhen sound replaced silence, when colour replaced black-and-white, when digital challenged celluloid, and now, when AI meets narrative.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dwivedi insisted that reimagining the movie\u2019s ending was not \u201cartificial storytelling,\u201d but \u201caugmented storytelling, a wave of the future\u201d.<\/p>\n
Has AI been used to alter films before?<\/p>\n
AI has not been used to alter the storyline of an existing movie by its own producers or crew for re-release before this.<\/p>\n
![\"titanic\"](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1993-1754503316.avif?w=770&quality=80\")
Director James Cameron with Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio on the Titanic door during filming [20th Century Fox]Will AI alterations become the norm in cinema?<\/p>\n