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James Dean to be digitally resurrected for a new movie.

Yep. They’re doing it. Apparently with his estate’s blessing.

Now. Digital de-ageing for flash-backs, or multi-era films? Fine. Doesn’t bother me. Indeed, it opens up new story telling possibilities.

Peter Cushing’s appearance in Rogue One (and indeed Carrie Fisher in Episode IX). OK, I get that. They were both iconic in their roles, so whilst a wee bit grave robbing for some, at least there’s justification.

This? This is outright ghoulish. They’re not completing a previous film, they’ve basically just bought the rights to his likeness.

Why? What is the angle here? It’s clearly not him. James Dean is categorically not making a new movie. Some poor sap is gonna play his part physically, and get second billing to a sodding picture.

It’s not often I get upset by stuff. But this has really made me feel queasy. Enough Hollywood. Put it down. Stop it. This minute, you sick, money grabbing ghouls.

Cushing and Fisher are ok, but this is wrong?

Arbitrary line in the sand is arbitrary.

How else can you keep salaries down unless you threaten to replace your employees with automation.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Cushing and Fisher are ok, but this is wrong?

Arbitrary line in the sand is arbitrary.

Difference, Cushing and Fisher were reprising iconic roles.

Especially Carrie Fisher, as that was untimely.

Cushing? It was his likeness being used, and used well. Though I concede it was a bit weird for the de-aged Carrie Fisher.

But this is something in a different league. This isn’t getting an existing character to look the part. This is a whole new film where they’re just grave robbing someone’s likeness for no readily apparent reason.

Unlike General Organa and Grand Moff Tarkin, there is no reason at all to use James Dean’s likeness in this movie. Absolutely none at all. Other than ghoulish greed.

Interesting, because there are no new ideas they are doing reboots

and now there are no new actors so they have to resurrect some?

I guess this is the time again were Euro-Films need to get things done

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Cushing and Fisher are ok, but this is wrong?

Arbitrary line in the sand is arbitrary.

Difference, Cushing and Fisher were reprising iconic roles.

Especially Carrie Fisher, as that was untimely.

Cushing? It was his likeness being used, and used well. Though I concede it was a bit weird for the de-aged Carrie Fisher.

But this is something in a different league. This isn’t getting an existing character to look the part. This is a whole new film where they’re just grave robbing someone’s likeness for no readily apparent reason.

Unlike General Organa and Grand Moff Tarkin, there is no reason at all to use James Dean’s likeness in this movie. Absolutely none at all. Other than ghoulish greed.

Did you not read my first post? This is just your personal threshold for having a problem, but it objectively makes no difference how these people are being used, the matter is simply is it right to do it or not?

Trying to draw degrees of objection based on arbitrary lines of distinction you've drawn up in your head is never going to make a robust argument. They could have written around Tarkin's involvement in R1, but made the decision not to and included him anyway. There was absolutely no requirement for a wholly original film to take that direction. That makes it negligibly different to writing a movie and "casting" an actor from beyond the grave.

The only thing that really matters is that the people who could legitimately be hurt by this, his family, are apparently on board. As long as that's legitimate and not arrived at through coercion then the only real argument is why not use an existing, still breathing, actor?

Fisher is largely featuring in ROS via existing footage to my understanding, so that's not the same thing, neither is digital ageing/de-aging.

I don't think it is ghoulish personally. I just think it's unnecessary and uncreative.

For Tarkin they could have just used stock footage, maybe some clever tricks of filmmaking (I just found out about the T2 garage scene where they didn't in fact have a mirror and it was body doubles on one end, blew my mind) or >gasp< hire an actor who could have passed for Tarkin at a glance or had the same silhouette. Same with Leia's scenes.

I feel the same way about this new tendency to "resurrect" dead actors as I do with fat suits to be honest. Gary Oldman is a great actor, but using him in a fat suit to portray Churchill? Why not just hire an actor who has a few extra pounds? Same with de-aging actors instead of just using an actor who might look like a younger version of the actor.

With that said, I have no real strong opinions about this. Just seems like a fad that will pass.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
James Dean to be digitally resurrected for a new movie.

Yep. They’re doing it. Apparently with his estate’s blessing.

Read: They drove a truckload of cash to the estate's doorstop.

OTOH, who the feth cares about James Dean anymore?

How many Elvis Impersonators are there? Heck pause and think that Elivs Impersonator is actually a JOB.

Acting has for generations always been about some nobody playing a somebody in someone else's story. With the very rare occasions where someone gets to play their themselves.


When you consider that we now use live actors with a digital overlay for fantasy creatures and machines and monsters; its not a huge stretch to consider using that same technology for overlaying a persons features. Be that a character with a unique appearance (say the Alita from the Alita film with the big eyes) all the way through to this.
The real oddity as such is that the actor is what's being recreated rather than the character.

It's basically a tech demo/publicity stunt/proof of concept. Someone wants to test to see if the tech is ready but isn't going to invest in it without a way to make back their funds. They get a name that will create the exact reaction we're seeing here to draw attention to the tech so they can start utilizing it other ways going forward.

Back when they used computers to "fill-in" for Brandon Lee on The Crow, I predicted there would be a time in my lifetime where we no longer needed actors. Only computer programs and pre-recorded and mixable audio files.

The Automation Replacement is now coming to the Arts too. Not just for Truckers, Service workers, and factory workers anymore. It is now coming to the "Creative Class". White Collar is not far behind.

 Easy E wrote:
Back when they used computers to "fill-in" for Brandon Lee on The Crow, I predicted there would be a time in my lifetime where we no longer needed actors. Only computer programs and pre-recorded and mixable audio files.

The Automation Replacement is now coming to the Arts too. Not just for Truckers, Service workers, and factory workers anymore. It is now coming to the "Creative Class". White Collar is not far behind.

White collar workers are actually easier to replace than blue collar. Blue collar takes software and expensive bespoke hardware that needs maintenance, white collar just takes software and cheap mass produced computers. Middle management, even most of upper management, will be gone long before the last factory worker disappears.

OK, so I am going to have another actor behind the CGI JD face and expect to try and enjoy another Oscar-worthy performance by the inimitable James Dean? oh for Gads sake, this is silly. I hope it bombs beyond comprehension and any future attempts to do this with anyone arbitrary (yes, to have JD star in a new pic is totally arbitrary) is quickly forgotten.

HOWEVER, to reprise really short roles on iconic series movies I can get behind, as it lends continuity and story familiarity. Cushing and Fisher; OK. Dumbledore in HP series; No - too much screen time and movies left, so another actor was totally the way to go.

...and yet we're to believe that Terminator 3 was OK?!?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Difference, Cushing and Fisher were reprising iconic roles.

Especially Carrie Fisher, as that was untimely.

What was untimely? Rogue One was made before Fisher died. They didn't CGI her because she was dead, they CGI'd her because she didn't look like an 18 year old anymore.


And, honestly, I wish they hadn't. The CGI for Leia was better than Tarkin's, but was still jarring and the movie would have been better off without it. Having those characters just glimpsed in the background, or only seen via hologram to disguise the fact that they don't look quite right would have been much better options.




But, really, I don't see the James Dean thing as any different. If it's been okayed by his estate, then there seems little moral ground to object on, and so far as the actual actor under the mocap being somewhat second-fiddle... well, I don't know the name of the guy under Jar Jar's head, either.


I expect that it's likely to look somewhat creepy, because full CGI human faces still just aren't quite 'there' yet... But it's difficult to object to it on a moral angle, if we haven't spent the last 100 years objecting to movies about other dead people's life stories...

Soon, I{ laws will have to encompass your likeness, handwriting style, speech patterns, and brain waves as being your own IP.






Automatically Appended Next Post:

 John Prins wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
Back when they used computers to "fill-in" for Brandon Lee on The Crow, I predicted there would be a time in my lifetime where we no longer needed actors. Only computer programs and pre-recorded and mixable audio files.

The Automation Replacement is now coming to the Arts too. Not just for Truckers, Service workers, and factory workers anymore. It is now coming to the "Creative Class". White Collar is not far behind.

White collar workers are actually easier to replace than blue collar. Blue collar takes software and expensive bespoke hardware that needs maintenance, white collar just takes software and cheap mass produced computers. Middle management, even most of upper management, will be gone long before the last factory worker disappears.

Yes, except middle managers are often the ones making the decisions on who and what to automate and therefore get to insulate themselves a bit.

 insaniak wrote:
But it's difficult to object to it on a moral angle, if we haven't spent the last 100 years objecting to movies about other dead people's life stories...

I don't know about that, I think it's pretty "Easy" to make a moral case against this. I think there is a fairly big gulf between using a "story" and actually using someone's "exact" likeness (although, in a way, they are akin).

In the case of Carrie Fisher, we can at least delude ourselves into figuring a sort of "implied consent" to being in a Star Wars movie, since, you know, she had been in them before. Not actual consent, but at least a notion of it.

In this case though, there is no consent at all, actual or implied. There was consent given on the part of his estate, but that is not his consent, which, of course, in unavailable because he is dead. In this case though, it likely is meaningless, because the movie likely isn't something reprehensible in-itself and might even be construed as something he'd do if alive.

But let's consider a different angle. Let's say I die and then, using something like deep-fakes or the like, someone pitches my family $20 and puts my face on someone doing absolutely reprehensible, immoral things. Now, is that moral? I would make a case that it is not, at least, somewhat convincingly so on the part of my family (in that they would sell my likeness to something immoral) and partly so on the person making the deep-fake, since they are pretty blatantly "buying" consent and leveraging the fact that I am dead to imply "no harm."

Now, can you make a convincing counter-case? I'm sure one can, but I don't see it clear-cut "absolutely" moral. There is a case to be made either way.

 H wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
But it's difficult to object to it on a moral angle, if we haven't spent the last 100 years objecting to movies about other dead people's life stories...

I don't know about that, I think it's pretty "Easy" to make a moral case against this. I think there is a fairly big gulf between using a "story" and actually using someone's "exact" likeness (although, in a way, they are akin).

In the case of Carrie Fisher, we can at least delude ourselves into figuring a sort of "implied consent" to being in a Star Wars movie, since, you know, she had been in them before. Not actual consent, but at least a notion of it.

In this case though, there is no consent at all, actual or implied. There was consent given on the part of his estate, but that is not his consent, which, of course, in unavailable because he is dead. In this case though, it likely is meaningless, because the movie likely isn't something reprehensible in-itself and might even be construed as something he'd do if alive.

But let's consider a different angle. Let's say I die and then, using something like deep-fakes or the like, someone pitches my family $20 and puts my face on someone doing absolutely reprehensible, immoral things. Now, is that moral? I would make a case that it is not, at least, somewhat convincingly so on the part of my family (in that they would sell my likeness to something immoral) and partly so on the person making the deep-fake, since they are pretty blatantly "buying" consent and leveraging the fact that I am dead to imply "no harm."

Now, can you make a convincing counter-case? I'm sure one can, but I don't see it clear-cut "absolutely" moral. There is a case to be made either way.

WOT HE SAID!

Seriously.

There’s a difference between using CGI resurrect a character’s likeness, and resurrecting an actor for a role.

For the hard of understanding. If this was using CGI to complete James Dean’s last film? I get that’s distasteful to many, but at least has some justifiable purpose.

Using CGI to insert some poor sod who died some quarter of a century before I was born, and damned near a Quarter century after their untimely passing? That’s outright distasteful. And speaks purely of bs profit motive.

Yet you still fail to grasp that this is still essentially what they did to Cushing, because Tarkin was not explicitly needed for Rogue One. You're leaning very hard on the assumption that because he was willing to do it once that somehow he'd be ok with doing it again. Without that assumption there's no argument that these are different.

Bollocks, quite frankly.

Imagine Rogue One without Tarkin. And then, come a New Hope? Who is this guy?

Could they have told a different tale? Yes.

Could they have told the same story without Tarkin? No,

But keep clutching at your straws on this one. You may even wish to re-read my original post, where I acknowledge that may be unappealing to some, but not me, without passing any kind of judgement either way.....

Carrie Fisher in ep IX isn't a digital recreation.
They filmed those scenes BEFORE she died.

Maybe you meant the younger "leia" from Rogue One. Where they used a younger Carrie Fisher morphed over another actress?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Could they have told a different tale? Yes.

Could they have told the same story without Tarkin? No.

There we go then, problem solved. No need to resurrect Cushing then, was there?

I acknowledge that may be unappealing to some, but not me

Which is my point. You've got weird cognitive dissonance going on about when it is acceptable to resurrect an actor and when it isn't, when the morality is that it either always is (with the blessing of any it might legitimately impact) or it never is.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Lick that deliberate edgelord obtuse!

Seriously.

Just stop.

Run out of argument then? I'm not being the least edgy, unless applying consistent logic to a situation is considered edgy now days?

not quite sure why the technomancy is faffing with the dead, surely tech is at the sim.1 point, just make virtual film stars, they don't age or misbehave

 Azreal13 wrote:
Which is my point. You've got weird cognitive dissonance going on about when it is acceptable to resurrect an actor and when it isn't, when the morality is that it either always is (with the blessing of any it might legitimately impact) or it never is.

That's an interesting "absolutist" position. But in reality, how are we to say everything has to be a binary, "always right" or "always wrong?"

For instance, is it ever moral to kill someone? In what case could we say yes and in what case no? Why is there a difference, if any and how can we know one case from another?

Except I'm not arguing everything is binary. Which, frankly, misrepresents my position so far as to be off topic.

I'm suggesting that, in this instance to try and argue that there is some sort of exception to the rights and wrongs of bringing an actor back from the dead based on how their likeness is used is a decidedly weak position to take.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Except I'm not arguing everything is binary. Which, frankly, misrepresents my position so far as to be off topic.

I'm suggesting that, in this instance to try and argue that there is some sort of exception to the rights and wrongs of bringing an actor back from the dead based on how their likeness is used is a decidedly weak position to take.

Your own words were "the morality is that it either always is (with the blessing of any it might legitimately impact) or it never is" but it's off topic to ask why you assume this case must be a binary? I should have chosen my words better, but I am specifically asking why, in this case, is it a fact of that matter that it must either always be right or always wrong?

 H wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Which is my point. You've got weird cognitive dissonance going on about when it is acceptable to resurrect an actor and when it isn't, when the morality is that it either always is (with the blessing of any it might legitimately impact) or it never is.

That's an interesting "absolutist" position. But in reality, how are we to say everything has to be a binary, "always right" or "always wrong?"

We don't need to be absolutist about it. But it is quite bizarre to take the contrary position: that the exact same thing is OK for one person and not OK for another, depending on who is getting digitized or what franchise they were in.

Dean is dead, Cushing is dead. Having either in a film is exactly equivalent, so 'Dean is wrong, but Cushing is OK' is pure cognitive dissonance.

No, the 'character' doesn't matter. No, Tarkin wasn't somehow necessary for Rogue One. White cloak guy was invented to be the manager of the death star project, and ghost Tarkin muddying up the plot with some upper level management shenanigans didn't make it better.

In and of itself, I really don't see a problem with this. The family is ok with this and there appears to be a desire to do it right, and it's not the first time this has been done.

Actors play and portray dead people all the time, and the likeliness of the dead has been used in cinema and art forever. I don't see how this is any different. Likewise, actors get hidden beneath masks and CGI routinely anyway for tons of characters, so feeling bad for the body actor shouldnt really be too much of an issue.

What I would find offensive would be a *bad* CGI portrayal. If the performance stands up, all should be well.