The Use of AI in ‘The Brutalist’ Has Moved Fans to Brand it a ‘Disgrace’

A man with a beard and dark hair stands outdoors, holding a coiled rope over his shoulder. He is wearing a dark jacket. A construction site with metal beams and a distant building can be seen in the background.
It has been revealed that a scene in The Brutalist was enhanced with AI so that Brody (pictured) can speak perfect Hungarian.

The Brutalist is coming under criticism for employing artificial intelligence to fill in language gaps and generate a series of architectural blueprints.

In an interview with Red Shark, the film’s editor Dávid Janscó revealed that in a two-minute segment of the movie, the team used AI voice cloning software Respeecher so Brody could read a letter in perfect Hungarian.

“I am a native Hungarian speaker and I know that it is one of the most difficult languages to learn to pronounce,” Janscó tells Red Shark. “Even with Adrien’s Hungarian background, it’s not that simple. It’s an extremely unique language. We coached [Brody and Felicity Jones] and they did a fabulous job but we also wanted to perfect it so that not even locals will spot any difference.”

Janscó says that the AI was used to enhance specific letter sounds. “If you’re coming from the Anglo-Saxon world certain sounds can be particularly hard to grasp,” he adds.

Three men stand on and around a large coal pile. One man stands atop the pile with a shovel, while the other two face him at the base. A large, ornate building is visible in the background. The scene has a vintage, cinematic feel.
Guy Pearce, Adrien Brody, and Isaach de Bankolé in The Brutalist.

The Brutalist, which is being tipped for Oscar nominations, stars Adrien Brody who plays Hungarian Jewish architect Lászlo Tóth, a Holocaust survivor looking to rebuild his life in the United States. The film’s running time is a whopping 215 minutes and it is shot on VistaVision; a higher resolution, widescreen variant of 35mm motion picture film.

The revelation that AI has been used in the movie has prompted outrage from some quarters which accuse the film of telling a story about a struggling artist while using a technology that takes artists’ work without permission. Some fans branded the move a “disgrace.”

The furore prompted the film’s director Brady Corbet to issue a statement to Deadline.

“Adrien and Felicity’s performances are completely their own. They worked for months with dialect coach Tanera Marshall to perfect their accents. Innovative Respeecher technology was used in Hungarian language dialogue editing only, specifically to refine certain vowels and letters for accuracy. No English language was changed. This was a manual process, done by our sound team and Respeecher in post-production. The aim was to preserve the authenticity of Adrien and Felicity’s performances in another language, not to replace or alter them, and done with the utmost respect for the craft.”

In the interview with Red Shark, the editor of the movie Janscó acknowledges that it is controversial to talk about AI in Hollywood but stresses that should not be the case.

“We should be having a very open discussion about what tools AI can provide us with. There’s nothing in the film using AI that hasn’t been done before. It just makes the process a lot faster. We use AI to create these tiny little details that we didn’t have the money or the time to shoot.”

Deadline notes that Rami Malek’s portrayal of Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody — a performance he won an Oscar for — heavily relied on automatic dialogue replacement (ADR). In fact, none of Malek’s singing came from his own vocal chords.

And there are reports that another film tipped for Oscar glory, Emilia Perez, also used the same Respeecher technology to enhance the singing voice of Karla Sofía Gascón.

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