Even though the AI-generated video of a fight scene between Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt has sent ripples across Hollywood, fueling hype and fear about AI in the creative industry, it seems all is well with independent filmmaker Albert Birney. His new film, Obex, which he wrote, directed and stars in, feels like the antithesis of the sophisticated production values and visual effects that modern AI tools can offer, allowing budget-minded filmmakers to rival Hollywood studios.
“AI has taken away the joy that you might get from the filmmaking process,” he told me ahead of the UK premiere of his film at the Glasgow Film Festival. “I can just type in ‘make this’ and it will make something ‘perfect’ for me. In fact, when I look at it I don’t have a soul. I can see that humans don’t have time for this.”
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Despite having a video game-themed premise, Obex intentionally leans toward a lo-fi style of filmmaking, even though films from Tron to Ready Player One have meant using cutting-edge technology to achieve it. The plot follows Connor Marsh, played by Barney, as he plays the titular new game when reality and the game world begin to blur.
Of course, this game is new considering the 1987 movie’s setting. It is played on Macintosh computers on floppy disks. It was an important personal decision to set the film in this era, as it coincided with the time when Albert discovered gaming.
“I got a Nintendo for my seventh birthday, and that was the beginning of a lifelong obsession with video games,” he says, but it was at a friend’s house that he experienced the original Mac.
“He had early Sierra games like ‘King’s Quest’ and ‘Space Quest,’ and even though they were very simple and black and white, they were very vivid to me. Some of my first gaming memories were getting lost in these pixelated worlds. So I think this movie is just trying to meld all the different ideas and feelings I had.”
Obex is in black and white, with attention paid to the details of tangible physical media, such as the bizarre sight of three CRT televisions stacked in Connor’s room. Barney accidentally retrieved them from a friend who was trying to get rid of them.
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There’s some creative license in the presentation of the game itself, but unlike many fake, fictional games you see in movies and TV shows that are usually just animations, the Obex you see was actually created in Unity by indie game developer Gabriel Koenig. Albert previously collaborated with Gabriel to create a game called Tux and Fanny (which is itself an adaptation of his animated film and is free to watch) here).
“I asked Gabriel to do it because I knew he was probably going to build it in Unity and just control a character walking around. Then he just screen recorded it. So what you see in the movie is him playing this little demo that he built,” Albert explains.
When it comes to creating elements that make the game world part of reality, Albert takes an old-school approach using physical costumes and practical effects. This is all part of the world-building fun he enjoys over time. Even when there are special effects, he intentionally doesn’t use the most subtle techniques.
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“I really love moving frame by frame, layering, drawing, and cutting using the stupidest programs like Photoshop and Premiere, so it’s almost like a collage-based special effect,” Albert explains. “There are a lot of smarter, faster ways to do it, but you lose something when you try those methods. When you use something like After Effects, you lose some kind of shake.”
In other words, the idea behind this imperfect, lo-fi style is an antidote to the sleek look promised by AI.
“What I feel with AI right now is that we are missing an important step that I think is where the soul emerges in a work of art,” Albert says. “Art is the transfer of the artist’s soul into the world. As the AI boom continues, I hope that more and more people will crave personal films made by people and want to feel the human touch in them.”
Obex will be available on Blu-ray and digital starting March 9th.
For more inspiration, check out our interview with Florence Miaille, director of the Oscar-nominated animated film Butterfly.
