{"id":351890,"date":"2026-03-18T03:14:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T03:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/351890\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T03:14:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T03:14:12","slug":"jia-zhangke-talks-ai-tools-in-filmmaking-at-2026-filmart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/351890\/","title":{"rendered":"Jia Zhangke Talks AI Tools In Filmmaking at 2026 Filmart"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tChinese auteur Jia Zhangke<\/a> says curiosity got the better of him when it came to exploring the idea of using artificial intelligence<\/a> in his work. The man behind such layered, award-wining art-house dramas such as Still Life (a Venice Golden Lion winner) and A Touch of Sin (a best screenplay prize winner at Cannes) has so far produced two shorts with AI and told a masterclass in Hong Kong this week that he wanted simply to see what might be possible with the technology that has many in the industry concerned<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI face new technology without making premature judgments,\u201d explained Jia during a discussion panel. \u201cI use it first to understand it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile international<\/a> creators \u2014 and Hollywood especially \u2014 are taking a cautious approach to embracing AI tools, things are moving far more quickly in some parts of Asia<\/a>. China is pushing the technology hard as part of its 15th Five Year Plan for economic development and Hong Kong\u2019s leaders are following suit.<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, the technology has virtually taken over Filmart<\/a>, the Hong Kong-set entertainment industry gathering that kicks off this week. The event, which is being staged at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, has a packed schedule of seminars, panels and workshops focused almost exclusively on pushing the positives of AI adoption.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut there was an air of practicality about Jia\u2019s session when the filmmaker dug into the topic. \u201cOf course, there are many good and bad aspects,\u201d said Jia. \u201cDon\u2019t rush to protest, don\u2019t rush to invest; there are definitely issues that we will address through legislation and laws. My curiosity lies in the fact that whenever a new technology comes along, it can bring benefits to the expression of film and the production mode of film. New media can present some spaces, ideas, and destinies that we couldn\u2019t reach in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAcross a wide-ranging and engaging talk, hosted as part of the Asian Film Awards program, the 55-year-old Jia threw in some surprises, including the claim he was once a champion breakdancer, and the fact that a commitment to jogging on a daily basis turned him from night owl into serious filmmaker.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe also lifted the lid on some of his filmmaking processes, another example of how he had adapted his craft to changes in technology. Jia decided to frame his acclaimed drama A Touch of Sin (2013) around four separate stories inspired by posts he had seen on social media, and how he had been struck by how the \u201cintensity and density of information dissemination had changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI found that every day when you open your social media, you will find a lot of things from all over the world,\u201d he said, of becoming obsessed with Weibo, often referred to as \u201cChina\u2019s Twitter.\u201d \u201cSuddenly, there appeared a sense that there are actually many unrelated things and many related ones. It made me think I should adopt this structure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBut underneath the tech talk, the session never strayed far from what Jia cares about most: the movies themselves.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI grew up in an era where we have never treated film as an isolated, closed art form; it is part of contemporary art,\u201d said Jia. \u201cAnd this part of contemporary art lies in the fact that when we live in the same social group, we actually have a lot of ways to interpret our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chinese auteur Jia Zhangke says curiosity got the better of him when it came to exploring the idea…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":351891,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,576,159334,159492,61,1042,60,143037,80,26421],"class_list":["post-351890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-asia","tag-filmart","tag-filmart-2026","tag-ie","tag-international","tag-ireland","tag-jia-zhangke","tag-technology","tag-thr-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=351890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/351891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=351890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=351890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=351890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}