The first AI-generated romantic comedy is coming out this summer – and the trailer looks as bad as you can imagine.Many actors, artists and writers rightly fear that generative AI will take away their jobs, but until now we have not seen a major entertainment company produce a feature-length film that was entirely or even significantly generated by AI. That’s about to change.
TCL, the company known for its smart TVs, has released a trailer for its first original feature film: an AI-generated romantic comedy called Next Stop Paris.
The film will be released this summer and will be broadcast on the company’s free streaming app TCLtv+, available on TCL TVs running the Google TV operating system. And “Next Stop Paris” will be the service’s first original content.
The 60-second trailer tells the story of two young and attractive Americans who meet on a train to Paris and fall in love. Her name is Claire, and his name is not mentioned other than to call him “a mysterious man who never shows his vulnerability.” So let’s just call him Stranger.
The two are shown enjoying the sights of a city that looks like Paris: an amusement park, a boat ride, strolls through the park, and a romantic dance inside a clock tower. There’s some conflict when the Stranger escapes from Claire on a motorcycle, but later in the trailer he returns to say he’ll never leave her. In general, typical chewing gum.
There is a flashback-like scene where Claire is shown wearing a diamond ring and getting married. Perhaps she’s a runaway bride, widow or divorcee starting a new life in Paris? There’s also advice from an old woman who tells Claire that “in the journey of life, sometimes the heart moves too fast, sometimes too slow, but if you catch the right moment, that’s when love comes.”
It looks a lot like another Hallmark movie, but without live actors and with cliches cranked up to the max. Not to mention that the “ears” of generative AI are too noticeable.