Nicolas Cage Condemns Use of AI: It “Cannot Reflect the Human Condition”
During his Saturn Awards acceptance speech this past weekend, actor Nicolas Cage warned his audience of the dangers of artificial intelligence both in and out of the entertainment industry, describing the emerging technology as “disturbing.”
Cage won the award for “Best Actor in a Film” for his role in 2024’s Dream Scenario. After thanking director Kristoffer Borgil, Cage turned his attention to AI. “There is another world that is also disturbing me. It’s happening right now around all of us: The new AI world. I am a big believer in not letting robots dream for us. Robots cannot reflect the human condition for us,” the actor said. “That is a dead end if an actor lets one AI robot manipulate his or her performance even a little bit, an inch will eventually become a mile and all integrity, purity and truth of art will be replaced by financial interests only. We cannot let that happen.”
“The job of all art in my view, film performance included, is to hold a mirror to the external and internal stories of the human condition through the very human thoughtful and emotional process of recreation. A robot cannot do that. If we let robots do that, it will lack all heart and eventually lose edge and turn to mush. There will be no human response to life as we know it. It will be life as robots tell us to know it,” he continued.
He left his fellow actors with a strong call to action: “I say, protect yourselves from AI interfering with your authentic and honest expressions.”
This is not the first time the actor has expressed concern with the use of AI in film and media. Nicolas Cage is attached to Spider-Man Noir, the upcoming live-action television spin off Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018). He underwent a series of body scans for the project and shared his concern that the data would be used to recreate his image after death.
“They have to put me in a computer and match my eye color and change — I don’t know,” he said. “They’re just going to steal my body and do whatever they want with it via digital AI … and it makes me wonder, you know, where will the truth of the artists end up? I mean, what are you going to do with my body and my face when I’m dead? I don’t want you to do anything with it!”
Nicolas Cage is hardly alone in expressing concern. Directors Guillermo Del Toro and Tim Burton and iconic animator Hayao Miyazaki are among other film professionals to speak out about the troubles of AI. Miyazaki has even gone so far as to call AI an “insult to life itself.”
AI-generated images and videos are becoming increasingly common. The internet is host to a wide array of uncanny AI clips. Films including Oscar nominated The Brutalist (2024) and Emilia Pérez (2024) have utilized AI to alter the voices of their actors, igniting fierce debate on if this constitutes a slippery slope.
Currently, AI technology is limited in its ability to create visually convincing depictions of humans that last longer than a few seconds. However, AI is evolving and improving quickly. It is not outlandish to think that in 5 years AI could be capable of producing videos of actors, or even non-celebrities, that are indistinguishable from reality. Cage voices concerns that may soon be relevant to all of us, not just those who live in the limelight.
A.J. Weiler writes about culture and entertainment. You can find her on Medium and Muck Rack.