Good morning 🐣

Frank Pavich writes in the New York Times:

I was recently shown some frames from a film that I had never heard of: Alejandro Jodorowsky’s 1976 version of “Tron.” The sets were incredible. The actors, unfamiliar to me, looked fantastic in their roles. The costumes and lighting worked together perfectly. The images glowed with an extravagant and psychedelic sensibility that felt distinctly Jodorowskian.

However, Mr. Jodorowsky, the visionary Chilean filmmaker, never tried to make “Tron.” I’m not even sure he knows what “Tron” is. And Disney’s original “Tron” was released in 1982. So what 1970s film were these gorgeous stills from? Who were these neon-suited actors? And how did I — the director of the documentary “Jodorowsky’s Dune,” having spent two and a half years interviewing and working with Alejandro to tell the story of his famously unfinished film — not know about this?

The truth is that these weren’t stills from a long-lost movie. They weren’t photos at all. These evocative, well-composed and tonally immaculate images were generated in seconds with the magic of artificial intelligence.

As Pavich goes on to explain, these images were created by Johnny Darrell using the Midjourney artificial intelligence program. Type in a variation on the prompt “production still from 1976 of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Tron” and less than a minute later you have a brand new, stunningly beautiful image, like this one:

Or like these:

It’s kind of mind boggling how realistic and how artistic these all seem. You can check out more in the Times article and on Darrell’s own charmingly retro site.

But Pavich ponders: “During the filming of my documentary, Alejandro told me about the Greek-Armenian philosopher and mystic George Gurdjieff. He taught that we are born without a soul and that our task in life is to help our soul to grow and develop: Souls aren’t born; they’re earned. … If, as Mr. Gurdjieff taught, creation leads to the development of one’s soul, whose soul is being developed here?”

And at what point will the software evolve so that you can input a screenplay and an entire movie pops out? Or perhaps more likely, an algorithm analyzes what people like to watch and the A.I. even generates the script? It collects your monthly Netflix subscription dues and spits out a custom movie just for you, then uses your subscription to pay to keep its own server running. The company wouldn’t need employees anymore. Or even a CEO. It’s just a zombie running for eternity, generating a thousand films per second.

Now that I’ve gone all apocalyptic on y’all, here are two images from another of Darrell’s projects for a fun little bonus, a fake film titled “Tone Death,” which comes with the tagline: “Rock ’n Roll is Here to Slay.” I’m heartbroken that I’ll never get to see these two characters in action:

As for the ethics of these things, last year I wrote, “The problem is that these programs are drawing from a massive trove of pre-existing photos and artwork, most likely without permission, and even somehow from people’s private medical records.” And sure enough there are already lawsuits of the copyright and class-action kind springing up against A.I. companies like Midjourney. The future has only just begun.

A brief intermission 🍿

Speaking of artificial intelligence gone wrong, if you haven’t seen this month’s fun and surprisingly stylish killer-robot/doll crowdpleaser of a hit, “M3GAN,” then you’re in luck; it’s now available on demand in the comfort of your own home.

But if that’s already too been-there, done-that for you, try “M3GAN” director Gerard Johnstone’s previous film, “Housebound” (2014 • Shudder and on demand • watch the trailer), a horror comedy out of New Zealand about a young woman placed on house arrest in her childhood home, only it just might be haunted.

Now ride this 👀

Yes, you read that right; “ride this,” not “watch this.”

You may not remember, but the official slogan of this newsletter is “exploring the bounds of cinema” and by golly I plan to stick to it.

I don’t just cover films worth watching, but the nexus between influencer and influenced, the regions on the periphery, where history, psychology, and art blur together. It’s a fairly sophisticated topic, which is why today I’ll obviously be talking about the new ride in Disneyland’s Toontown, “Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway” (opening Friday, January 27 • Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif.).

In all honesty, it’s pretty amazing. The ride uses the same technology as their “Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance” — a trackless “automated guided vehicle,” more typically seen in warehouses and factories, but becoming quite a trend in the theme park industry. I repeat, there is no track. There are no guide rails. It relies instead on GPS and other wireless cues. This means it can move, reverse, and spin in any direction and can be totally randomized, so the ride will feel like a different experience each time you go on it.

And then there’s what they are calling “2 ½ D” (3D without the glasses). The premise is that you’re stepping into the cartoon world, so they project flat 2D cartoon images in 360° environments onto real, physical surfaces. It’s a vibrant, tactile effect that I’ve never seen before.

One minute you’re on a train with Goofy as the engineer, the next minute each train car splits away and goes careening through a tornado, a tropical paradise, a big city where you can actually feel the rumble of the jackhammer across the street. There are so many fun surprises and special effects, it’s almost overwhelming. You will absolutely notice new details each time you go on it.

The queue for the ride is styled after the El Capitan theater in Hollywood (in this case the El Capi-toon), so it’s like you are entering and becoming part of a movie. Fake props from cartoon history are spread throughout, but the style of the characters on the ride itself is modern, as seen in some of Disney’s newer shorts. You may remember I mentioned a few weeks ago that the copyright for Mickey Mouse’s original appearance (“Steamboat Willie”) is about to expire, so they need to continue innovating and changing things to keep some semblance of Mickey solely controlled by Disney.

It’s a fitting tribute and transformation as the Walt Disney Company enters its 100th anniversary this year. And the ride is just dang fun!

Until next time! 👋