How an AI platform is set to help both Warner Bros and STX pick which movies to produce.
Warner Bros – and I don’t think this is being particularly acknowledged – had a bold and varied slate of films in 2019. It took gambles on non-franchise fare, looking beyond sequels and capes, and presented a fair range of films.
Most of which struggled. The studio was hit by the underperformance at the box office of productions such as Motherless Brooklyn and The Good Liar. It made good films, that didn’t find an audience. Although its gamble on Joker certainly paid off, with over $1bn through the tills.
But now we learn that Warner Bros is turning to artificial intelligence to help choose which movies to make.
It’s inked a deal to use a system called Cinelytic, a project management tool underpinned by AI, that uses masses of data to quickly calculate the potential return of a film around the world. It follows STX, who signed up to use the system last autumn.
Whether the system could have predicted the sizeable success of STX’s Hustlers is open to debate.
The studio still intends to use a dose of gut instinct too. We wait to see just what impact the new AI tool will have. Scary times.
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