The Creator: The Oppenheimer of AI

Gareth Edwards has a habit of creating iconic moments, often at scale. He is able to capture events on camera that feel impossibly huge, but at the same time, incredibly intimate. 

Witnessing Darth Vader taking down a corridor of rebels in his prime as the planet below explodes.

Two giant aliens mating at a gas station as the human protagonists kiss for the first time.

A squad of soldiers leap from a plane as they halo jump metres from iconic kaiju; Godzilla. 

So with his new mesmerising sci-fi film The Creator, he again combines stunning, personal performances from his leads along with a problem and challenge so vast that it’s both affecting the real and fictional worlds - AI. 

It was not by design, but The Creator is a film about the world in conflict as it struggles to co-exist with AI, released at a time where…the world is in conflict as it struggles to co-exist with AI. With society at the crossroads of embracing artificial intelligence and grappling with its potential consequences, Edward’s film serves as a thought-provoking exploration of our intricate relationship with the technology at the most opportune moment possible.

Set in a not-so-distant future, The Creator lets audiences immerse themselves into a world where AI has become an integral part of our everyday lives, even more so than today. Edwards skillfully weaves a narrative that delves into the ethical, moral, and existential questions surrounding AI, offering a nuanced perspective on humanity's creation and its potential consequences.

The world is split into two sides. Those that live symbolically in relative coexistence with the technology - New Asia in the East, and those that see it only as a threat to their existence that set out to destroy it at all costs - the West. 

At heart of the conflict lies Nirmata aka ‘The Creator’, the elusive architect of advanced AI who has developed a weapon to end the war between human and machine, by creating something that can control all technology, everywhere, at once, and with the power to destroy all humanity. 

In the words of the director it's “the Oppenheimer of AI”. 

The worldbuilding of The Creator is rich, deep and tangible. Some critics and audiences have uttered it in the same breath as the likes of The Terminator, Aliens and Blade Runner. Each one of those films builds worlds that feel within touching distance of our own. They deal with similar and connected themes, whether it be fear of our own creations, cybernetic uprisings or existential questions about what it means to be ‘alive’. 

Edwards has not only encapsulated these beats in a unique, emotive and visionary way, creating one of the most aesthetically and cinematically stunning movies put to film in years, but did so using a camera you can literally buy on high street. 

Essentially reverse engineering how giant VFX blockbusters are made, Edwards told Empire Magazine that he shot the film as it was a ‘contemporary film about a contemporary war, in real locations, and layered in the sci-fi later’. In effect doing his cinematic worldbuilding in the real world and challenged the methodology, budget requirements and culture around blockbuster movie making. He’s made a movie for 80 million dollars that puts some of this summer’s blockbusters and their budgets to shame. 

And to further blur the lines and merge reality and fiction, he often did not tell actors when they were playing human or machine characters so as to create ambiguity in their performances and further hammer home the evolved sentience and human-like qualities. 

The promise and potential of AI’s role in healthcare, climate change solutions and optimisation are something reflected in both The Creator and our current discourse, and the questions posed around existential threats and profound moral decisions are also prevalent in both. 

The world of The Creator is one that feels eerily familiar and yet profoundly unsettling. We witness characters wrestle with the ethical dilemmas and unforeseen consequences of their creations and actions. A reminder that the challenges surrounding AI are not limited to the realm of science fiction, but are very much a part of our present and future.

The film encourages us to engage in meaningful discussions about AI ethics, regulation, and our moral responsibilities as creators, a cautionary tale and call to action as we navigate the ever-evolving landscape and its potential consequences of unchecked technological advancement.

Edwards tells Empire Magazine that; “when it comes to worldbuilding, the best thing is often to merge two existing things”. 

That clearly resonates from a creative perspective, as Steve Jobs once said, ‘creativity is just connecting things’, but beyond the artistic direction and vision on screen, we need to ensure that the world we continue to build in our reality, does not lead to a reality that for now, lives only as on-screen entertainment. 

Edwards shows that we must tread lightly as we continue to connect and merge AI with our ways of living, charting a course that strengthens our societies, not destroys them.

But he does so in one of the most visually stunning and entertaining movies of the year, using rule 101; educate and entertain.