Oscar-winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro declared he will never use AI-generated video in his movies, slamming the technology and its champions during a recent interview with NPR’s Fresh Air. The Frankenstein director said he hopes to “remain uninterested in using it at all until I croak,” sharply contrasting Hollywood’s growing embrace of artificial intelligence.
Asked about AI’s role in storytelling, del Toro compared modern tech developers to the reckless scientist in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. “I did want to have the arrogance of Victor be similar in some ways to the tech bros,” he said. “He’s kind of blind, creating something without considering the consequences.”
Del Toro expressed deep skepticism that AI can ever replicate the emotional depth of human creativity, dismissing the idea that “ones and zeros” can capture the “alchemy of emotion, spirituality, and feeling.”
When directly asked whether he used AI in his latest Netflix-produced film, the 61-year-old director responded bluntly: “I’d rather die.” He emphasized his total rejection of generative AI, even as Netflix itself has announced an “all-in” commitment to the technology to lower production costs.
The interview also touched on immigration. As a Mexican national living in Los Angeles, del Toro shared that he carries his legal documentation at all times, due to past encounters with immigration officials. “I have a wallet the size of a leather portfolio… I’ve been stopped in the past and asked to show my papers,” he said.
Del Toro has occasionally spoken on left-wing political topics. After President Donald Trump’s 2016 election, he likened the MAGA movement to a racist “cancer.” More recently, he joined Hollywood campaigns accusing Israel of “genocide” during its war against Hamas and opposed school restrictions on sexually explicit material.
