[ad_1]
Morgan Neville’s new documentary, Roadrunner: a film about Anthony Bourdain, uses behind-the-scenes video footage and archival audio recordings to paint an intimate portrait of the iconic chef-writer-host, who died by suicide in 2018. But while Neville and his team have put together audio clips from podcasts , radio appearances, audiobooks and voiceover sessions for Bourdain to tell his own posthumous documentary, a few lines had to be digitally created. “I created an AI model of his voice,” Neville said the New Yorker. As in, a deepfake. “If you watch the movie… you probably don’t know what other lines the AI said, and you won’t,” he continued. “We can have a documentary ethics panel on this later.”
This documentary ethics panel seems to be taking place on Twitter, where movie reviews and Fans expressed unease over Bourdain’s voice being used to express things he has never said, especially since he has previously accused Travel Channel of altering his voiceover on No reservations to give the impression that he approved of Cadillacs. Neville provided more details in an interview with GQ, clarifying that he wanted to include certain thoughts that Bourdain had written down, but that he had never actually said aloud.
“I didn’t put words in his mouth,” he explained. “I was just trying to bring them to life.” Neville also indicated that he received the blessing of Bourdain’s widow and literary agent, who told him, “Tony would have been cool with that.” (Presumably the widow he is referring to is Bourdain’s ex-wife, Ottavia Busia, who is interviewed in Roadrunner. Neville also been criticized for neglecting to interview Bourdain’s girlfriend at the time of his death, Asia Argento.) Tony may have been cool with this, but the Twitterati certainly isn’t.
[ad_2]
Source link