Use AI to Make Sex and Nudity Great for Everyone
Discover more from Let's Not Be Trash
Use AI to Make Sex and Nudity Great for Everyone
There should never have been an unwritten ‘pastime’ for actors, especially women, to do scenes with their bodies that they didn’t want to do.
As negotiations on pay continue between actors, writers, greedy CEOs and producers, there’s another component of tv and film that should be reconsidered: nudity and sex.
There have been numerous instances of actors, especially women, doing nudity/sex scenes because they felt pressured, or that it was necessary for their success in the industry. This includes instances of women being mistreated and having personal boundaries crossed on set.
Art is subjective, but the notion that it must include someone’s discomfort to be impactful isn’t. It’s true that part of acting can be to expand horizons and move out of one’s “comfort zone,” but everyone is entitled to their boundaries, especially the ones they place on their body.
While, the #metoo movement has had an impact on actors’ comfort on set, with most sets now required to have an intimacy coordinator, there is still plenty of room for improvement. For example, what if the choice to participate in sexual activity or be naked on screen at all was just that—truly a choice?
An AI kiss has already been done in one film. Ironically, by the same man who seems to misunderstand boundaries with his own significant other. Why not use AI to create intimate moments for actors who do not feel comfortable doing those scenes?
Sex scenes that don’t follow actors’ expectations aren’t automatically coercion and some may consent to participate, even when given alternatives. But I do think nudity and sexual acts in film and tv have been built on the foundation of limited choice. If you are an actor, especially a woman, and you’re in the industry where ‘sex sells’— fans, producers, directors at some point are going to want you to be naked on camera.
AI has already replaced a kiss, could unfairly replace extras by copying their likeness in any scene they would be used in, and already can create entire alternate versions of media—taking fan fiction to the next level. Why can’t it take two people and place them on top of each other/next to each other/w.e. form of nasty happenin? Why can’t it replace someone’s actual chest/genitals?
Well, it can. It’s not a matter of “can;” although, I’m sure those arguments, no matter how much proven otherwise, will be incoming.
Why? ‘Artistic and directorial freedom.’ This was director Bernardo Bertolucci’s justification for not telling Maria Schneider that she would be penetrated with something in Last Tango in Paris. He wanted her ‘pure unadulterated’ reaction. As did many other directors toward women in their film. Sex, nudity, and vulgarity have long been considered a necessity, no matter how drawn out, explicit, arguably degrading, and occasionally discomforting, the scene is.
Sometimes, the actors involved, at least vocally in public, support the decisions of directors. But some in the industry, like Halle Berry, feel it’s never absolutely necessary to executing the purpose of the film. Regardless of opinion, in the past, there have been few to no alternatives offered.
Now that there is an alternative, how important will it be for the creative direction of a film for someone’s actual nudity to retain the ‘authenticity’ and ‘passion’ of the whole film? I’m sure some will maintain that the “titties must be real to retain the film’s integrity”, and it has nothing to do with “the male gaze” or that of millions of men who love gazing on said titties.’ Some may feel it’s the only way to get their actors to “give everything,” like French director Abdellatif Kechiche of Blue is the Warmest Color who insisted that a ‘lesbian scene was vital to the plot of a movie and then took 10 days to film. The actors involved called the experience “horrible” and France’s film union said it “violated actors Adelè Exarhcopolous and Léa Seydoux’s rights.”
Are these reasons enough to supersede an actor’s desire to not be nude in a film given the choice? Because film and tv does’t exist without actors. And respecting their body and boundaries is respecting their integrity—thus, the creative product by extension.
There is no reason to not take this opportunity of computer generated realism and use it to help humans fulfill their roles better— with more comfort and confidence. Shit, some actors who otherwise wouldn’t do certain roles because they involve physical intimacy and/or nudity may now be interested. This could broaden the pool of actors for a role—not constrict it.
Incorporating AI in these scenes doesn’t mean there will be no ‘authentic’ nudity or sex; it just means there will be options. Actors, original or body double, can choose to be nude and act out sex scenes within their set limitations—or not. Nudity and sex just shouldn’t be a barrier for actors, especially women, to ascend in film. We should set the bar much higher than ‘not being violated on or off set by someone affiliated with production.’ We should strive for actors to not feel they must sacrifice the boundaries of their bodies for the course of their career.
The boundaries of art are undefined. The boundaries of the people who make it, are. In aggregate, there is still art. The art and impact of filmmaking should not be stymied by a near exact replica of a scene curated to the greatest standard of comfort and consent of everyone involved.
And if that art with such substitutions is perceived as “reduced,” that ain’t something AI or no AI could fix, because then the error is human. Or as they say in IT community, PEBCAK. Problem Exists Between Chair and Keyboard—aka you— the “creative” directors. The “genius.”