{"id":299797,"date":"2026-02-24T13:37:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T13:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/299797\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T13:37:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T13:37:08","slug":"ai-film-is-pulled-from-theaters-following-backlash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/299797\/","title":{"rendered":"AI Film is Pulled From Theaters Following Backlash"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AA scene from \u2018Thanksgiving Day\u2019, an AI-generated film slated to play in theaters. <\/p>\n

After winning the inaugural Frame Forward AI Animated Film Festival, Igor Alferov expected his short, Thanksgiving Day, to be the first AI-generated film to run nationwide as part of his prize \u2014 but that\u2019s now how it turned out. <\/p>\n

After it was leaked online that the AI flick was going to screen before feature presentations, people directed their anger toward AMC Theatres.<\/p>\n

The Hollywood Reporter (THR) contacted AMC<\/a>, which protested that it had not programmed the AI film and a third-party company called Screenvision Media, which organizes the ad-driven pre-show, had arranged it. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis content is an initiative from Screenvision Media, which manages pre-show advertising for several movie theatre chains in the United States and runs in fewer than 30 percent of AMC\u2019s U.S. locations,\u201d AMC tells THR in a statement. \u201cAMC was not involved in the creation of the content or the initiative and has informed Screenvision that AMC locations will not participate.\u201d<\/p>\n

It means AMC Theatres customers will not get to see Thanksgiving Day by Kazakhstani filmmaker Alferov, who used AI Google\u2019s Gemini 3.1 and Nano Banana Pro to make the prize-winning film. <\/p>\n

The short \u201cfollows a bear and his platypus assistant traveling through the galaxy in a spacecraft that looks like a dumpster. They have to deal with corrupt space-cops, hygiene officials, and a very unusual type of food delivery service as the story unfolds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unavoidable AI <\/p>\n

But while theater-goers will no longer see Thanksgiving Day, could they be unwittingly watching AI during the main presentation? Janice Min, a Hollywood insider, believes so. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing with AI right now in Hollywood: Everyone\u2019s lying just a little bit,\u201d Min, CEO of Hollywood media group Ankler Media, tells Business Insider<\/a>. \u201cStudios are lying about how much they\u2019re using it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Min, a former editor of THR, says that companies are hiding how much AI they\u2019re using while also characterizing Tinseltown as a bit of a grim place right now. <\/p>\n

\u201cI guarantee that every single studio, every single streamer, they are all completely doing this [using AI],\u201d says Min. \u201cDuring last year\u2019s Oscar race, there was a controversy about The Brutalist<\/a>, and how Adrian Brody\u2019s voice was made more Hungarian-accented through technology. This year, it is crickets.\u201d <\/p>\n

But Min says that silence is to do with Hollywood not having a great deal of confidence right now as work dries up \u2014 even comparing it to Detroit. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou look at L.A. and you think it\u2019s sunny and amazing and people are happy. People are having a hard time here. The unemployment rate of Los Angeles is much higher than the national average,\u201d Min tells Business Insider. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re seeing a city that is so big and sprawling, with a kind of rudderless feeling: Who\u2019s going to stop this? There is definitely a Detroit vibe underway if things don\u2019t course correct.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a friend who\u2019s been sending me LinkedIn posts that are showing up in his feed, and it is so grim,\u201d she continues. \u201cIt\u2019s people largely who have worked in VFX, and they are posting this full-on bleed out, like \u2018I will be homeless by next Thursday if I don\u2019t have work.\u2019 It doesn\u2019t appear they\u2019re being hyperbolic.\u201d <\/p>\n

Image credits: Frame Forward Film Festival<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A scene from \u2018Thanksgiving Day\u2019, an AI-generated film slated to play in theaters. After winning the inaugural Frame…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":299798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,164770,98659,164771,164772,363,364,8172,9719,36826,409,111,139,69,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-299797","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-aifilm","10":"tag-aigenerated","11":"tag-aimovie","12":"tag-amctheatres","13":"tag-artificial-intelligence","14":"tag-artificialintelligence","15":"tag-backlash","16":"tag-cinema","17":"tag-genai","18":"tag-movies","19":"tag-new-zealand","20":"tag-newzealand","21":"tag-nz","22":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/299798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}