#13 - Generative AI is Making A Movie!
Goodbye Camera Operators 📽️
Welcome to the 13th issue of AI Agents Simplified! 🎉
❤️ Thank You! Literally YOU..
In the last 30 days of April, we started this journey with one goal:
To make AI Agents, Simplified.. For everyone.
As you already know, starting is the hardest part. But we did it and we did it right.
(Thanks to all of you!)
We hit a bunch of milestones we’re proud of:
🚀 5K+ subscribers
🌍 6K+ followers on Substack
🔥 18K+ views, all in just 30 days
📝 20 blog posts/issues published
This is just the beginning.
We’ve got some wild content and plans lined up and we’re just getting started.
We’re learning, building, helping, and growing together. And the whole AI Agents Simplified team genuinely appreciates every single one of you.
Thanks for riding with us.
The best is yet to come. ❤️
📰 What Happened in the Last Week?
Natasha Lyonne Is Directing a New Sci-Fi Movie Made with Generative AI
Yeah, you read that right!
Natasha Lyonne (you know her from Poker Face, Russian Doll, etc.) is directing and starring in a new sci-fi film created in collaboration with generative AI. The film, aptly titled Uncanny Valley, is co-written by Lyonne and The OA’s Brit Marling, and it tells the story of a teenage girl whose world gets flipped upside down by a viral VR game. Pretty on-brand for the times.
But here’s where things get interesting: the movie’s trippy visuals are being built using AI! Not just any AI though. This is being handled by Asteria, a new production company focused on generative tools. Asteria was co-founded by Lyonne and her partner, filmmaker Bryn Mooser (Body Team 12, Lifeboat), and it’s pitching itself as the ethical AI alternative.
Their secret sauce? A proprietary AI model called Marey, developed by Moonvalley (a generative text-to-video startup). What makes Marey “special” is that it’s supposedly trained entirely on licensed content, meaning all the original creators were actually paid. That’s a big deal, especially considering how many AI companies are currently under fire for scraping the internet without permission.
In her statement, Lyonne compared the vibe of the film to something out of The Matrix, but if it were starring Diane Wiest and Diane Keaton at their most talkative. Honestly? That sounds kind of amazing:
“Imagine if Dianne Wiest and Diane Keaton, at their loquacious best, decided to take a journey through The Matrix for sport, only to find themselves holding up an architectural blueprint, and you’ll have a sense of the adventure we’ve been on,” said Lyonne.
Also involved? Tech visionary Jaron Lanier, so yeah, this isn’t just some hype project slapped together with AI filters.
But here’s the bigger picture:
This film is dropping at a time when Hollywood is still trying to figure out how to not piss off every living actor, writer, and artist when it comes to AI. Just last year, the idea of using AI to replicate actors was part of what sparked that industry-wide strike. And only a few weeks ago, 400+ artists signed a letter criticizing OpenAI and Google for defending AI training on copyrighted content “in the name of national security.”
So now the question is: Can a generative AI film built the “ethical” way actually resonate with audiences? Or is this just shiny tech hype wrapped in an indie film pitch? Time will tell.
There’s no release date yet, and it’s unclear whether Uncanny Valley is heading to theaters or straight to streaming. But one thing’s for sure, everyone’s gonna be watching closely. Whether that’s out of curiosity, support, or concern? That’s up to the viewers.
🔮 Cool AI Tools & Repositories
🤖 Agent of the Week
Agent S is an open-source framework designed to enable autonomous interaction with computers through Agent-Computer Interface. Their mission is to build intelligent GUI agents that can learn from past experiences and perform complex tasks autonomously on your computer.
🤔 Poll Time
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Sorry.. I've missed it.. I'm new here! Sounds interesting though! :-)