Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones in The Brutalist.
Brutalist director Brady Corbet is addressing the backlash caused by the revelation that AI was used in parts of the film’s making.
Corbet released a statement following the revelations by the film’s editor, Dávid Jancsó, in a January 11 interview with the technology publication Red shark news.
In the interview, Jancsó said that AI was used to modify parts of the Hungarian dialect in the film used by stars Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones, as well as to create architectural drawings that appeared near the end of the film.
The use of AI was one of the biggest sticking points in the Screen Actors Guild and Writers Guild of America attacks against Hollywood studios in 2023.
As such, backlash erupted on social media following Jancsó’s revelations, including the post on X below.
In Corbet’s statement, the Golden Globe-winning director defended the use of AI to alter Brody and Jones’ dialogue and explained how it was implemented in Brutalist.
“Adrien and Felicity’s performances are completely their own. They worked for months with dialect coach Tanera Marshall to perfect their accents,” Corbet said in the statement (via Diversity).
“Innovative speaker technology was used only in the editing of the Hungarian language dialogue, specifically to refine certain vowels and letters for accuracy. No English language has been changed. This was a manual process, done by our voice team and Respeecher in post-production,” Corbet’s statement added. “The goal was to preserve the authenticity of Adrien and Felicity’s performances in another language, not to replace or alter them, and to do so with the utmost respect for the craft.”
Respeecher is the same Ukrainian startup that developed the AI technology to accurately recreate James Earl Jones’ voice as Darth Vader for future use in any Star Wars projects. for Vanity Fairthe actor signed over the rights to use his voice for Darth Vader to Lucasfilm in 2022. Jones died in September 2024 at the age of 93.
Jancsó said Red shark news that the production turned to the use of AI when ADR – which stands for automated dialogue replacement – was not satisfactory enough. Jancsó told the publication that he is “a Hungarian speaker” and “it’s one of the hardest languages to learn to pronounce.”
“If you come from the Anglo-Saxon world, some sounds can be particularly difficult to understand. We first tried to fix these more difficult elements with actors,” Jancsó told the publication. “Then we tried to solve them completely with other actors, but that didn’t work. So we looked for other options than how do we improve it.”
MADRID, SPAIN – JANUARY 17: Actor Adrien Brody (L) and director Brady Corbet (R) attend ‘The … [+]
Brady Corbet also addressed the use of AI imagery in The Brutalist
Also in David Jancsó’s interview with Red shark news around Brutalistthe publication noted that Generative AI was used near the end of the film in an homage to the work of Adrien Brody’s fictional character László Tóth.
In his statement on Monday, Brady Corbet clarified how AI was used on the scene.
“[Production designer] Judy Becker and her team did not use artificial intelligence to create or make any of the buildings. All images are hand-drawn by artists,” Corbet said (via Diversity). “To clarify, in the commemorative video shown in the background of a photograph, our editorial team created photographs deliberately designed to look like poor digital renderings circa 1980.”
for The Hollywood Reporterfilmmakers turned to using AI due to tight budget constraints with The Brutalistwhich the trade publication said cost less than $10 million.
Controversy over the use of AI in The Brutalist comes at a crucial time for the hopeful awards season as nominations for the 2025 Oscars will be announced on Thursday.
The revelation certainly didn’t sit well with X users like @midsommarz, who posted: “My take on The Brutalist AI is that it’s a slippery slope to giving Adrian Brody knowing his accent has been modified with HE. IMO changing such an AI performance should automatically disqualify someone from these award shows.”
Nominations for the 97th Academy Awards will be announced Thursday after the ceremony was postponed twice amid wildfires in the Los Angeles area.
The Brutalist recently earned a Best Picture nomination from the Producers Guild of America, and Corbet was nominated for Best Director from the Directors Guild of America. The film has also been nominated for Best Picture and Best Director by the British Academy of Film and Television and Critics Choice Awards.
In addition, Brody has been nominated for Outstanding Male Actor in a Motion Picture by the Screen Actors Guild Awards, BAFTA and CCA.
Brutalist It recently won Golden Globes for Best Picture – Drama, Best Actor (Drama) for Brody and Best Director for Corbet.
