AI video is rapidly becoming more realistic with models like Veo 3 and Runway Gen 4.5, and its output could not only help make movies cheaper and faster, but could lead to the creation of entirely new art forms.
This is the perspective of Ben Horowitz, co-founder of venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz. He recently shared his evolving views on AI video generation. Horowitz argues that, rather than viewing this technology as simply an efficiency tool for traditional filmmaking, it represents something fundamentally different: a paradigm shift comparable to the leap from theater to film. His comments come at a time when AI video tools are rapidly advancing and some filmmakers are already experimenting with these technologies in professional productions.
“We’re starting to realize that things like this AI video aren’t about making the old thing more efficient. It’s a new medium. It’s really new in the same way that movies weren’t theater,” Horowitz said. “AI video is not video at all. The story it tells is completely different. We can do things that we wouldn’t have been able to do without a $200 million budget. And now we’re like, okay.”
Comparisons to earlier films are especially apt. When film first came out, many dismissed it as just “canned theater”, a cheap way to record stage performances. It took decades for filmmakers to realize that film had its own unique grammar: close-ups, cuts, montages, camera movements, and the ability to tell stories in ways that weren’t possible on stage. Horowitz seems to suggest that AI video will follow a similar trajectory, developing its own storytelling techniques and possibilities that we are only beginning to glimpse.
Horowitz pointed to current hiring patterns in the film industry as evidence that that change is already underway. “People at the cutting edge of the film industry can now create entire scenes for a movie, edit and change a movie.[They can]have AI actors do a third cut at a level of quality where you won’t even know they were acting,” he explained.
This observation touches on what seems to be the most immediate impact of AI video: dramatically lowering the barrier to entry for high-quality visual storytelling. What once required large staffs, expensive equipment, and months of post-production work can now be accomplished by small teams (or even individuals) with access to AI tools. Democratization could be as important as what YouTube did for video distribution or what smartphones did for photography.
“I think it’s going to change dramatically again. There’s going to be space not just for new creators, but for new entertainment entrepreneurs that no one is imagining right now,” Horowitz concluded.
Its influence extends beyond Hollywood. Recent developments suggest that Horowitz’s theory is already being played out across the industry. Startups like OpenAI’s Sora, Google’s Veo, and Runway are in a fierce race to improve video quality and length. Meanwhile, creators are experimenting with AI-generated music videos, advertising content, and even short stories that would have been prohibitively expensive just two years ago. In July this year, Netflix announced that it had used AI for the first time in its Argentinian show “The Eternauts,” while Amazon Prime announced that it had made heavy use of AI in its show “House of David.” A 2012 Indian film was re-released this year with an alternate ending created by AI.
The question is not whether AI will change video production. It’s already happening. The question is: What new artistic possibilities emerge when creators stop thinking of AI as a tool to create traditional content more efficiently and start exploring what’s possible when they can conjure up any image, any scene, any world from a text prompt? Just as Alfred Hitchcock could not create Psycho on stage, tomorrow’s creators may create works that could not exist without AI. And you’ll need new vocabulary to describe them.
