After enjoying a five-decades-long career as a film critic, director, and screenwriter, Paul Schrader has come to the conclusion that AI is better at writing movies than humans.
For a certain subset of the population, Schrader is most recognizable as the pen behind Martin Scorsese projects like Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). For a younger demographic, he is best known for directing the erotic thriller The Canyons (2013), written by Bret Easton Ellis and starring Lindsay Lohan and James Deen (of adult film fame).
On Jan. 17, 2025, Schrader took to Facebook to announce “I’M STUNNED.” He elaborated: “I just asked chatgpt for “an idea for Paul Schrader film.” Then Paul Thomas Anderson. Then Quentin Tarantino. Then Harmony Korine. Then Ingmar Bergman. Then Rossellini. Lang. Scorsese. Murnau. Capra. Ford. Speilberg. Lynch. Every idea chatgpt came up with (in a few seconds) was good. And original. And fleshed out.”
Schrader ended his post by asking why “writers sit around for months searching for a good idea when AI can provide one in seconds?” and he got quite the response to his query. Concerns were raised about AI having hacked his Facebook page, but mostly people agreed that ChatGPT primarily functions as a new type of search engine, aggregating already existing content and concepts.
One Facebook user pointed out that none of ChatGPT’s ideas are original: “They have been taken from writers.” Piggybacking on that, another posited that “In order for this to even happen, there first has to BE a Paul Schrader, a Paul Thomas Anderson, a Quentin Tarantino, etc. Chatgpt can’t give you prompts if these writers didn’t put their work out there first.”
Others felt that ChatGPT-written films would eliminate the human element of cinema. One user commented “We get upset when you suggest that a soul isn’t a requirement for being a good writer.” Another wrote “Maybe it’s okay for basically plot-led films, but for films that are led by the HUMAN subconscious, memories, having lived a life, basically magic … AI does not compare.”
An X account honed in on the irony of the situation, describing Schrader’s post by saying “Writer of the legendary movie Taxi Driver is having an existential crisis about AI.”
Schrader fans know that filmmakers’ work often focuses on troubled characters with self-destructive tendencies experiencing existential crises. (Schrader himself has dubbed some of them “man in a room” stories, explaining to The New York Times, “It’s about evolution of the soul of these people who are locked off in their rooms and can’t reach out and touch anyone.”)
The idea that a successful filmmaker would spend hours locked in a room of his own, frantically prompting AI to come up with movie pitches while failing to see how his own work has imbued AI with its powers sounds like a Paul Schrader movie pitch ChatGPT might come up with — no offense to ChatGPT.
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