[Dispatch=Reporter Jung Tae-yun] A director who seemed furthest from AI has returned with a film about humanoids. He submitted the screenplay for his new work "Lamb in a Box" to ChatGPT.

"ChatGPT gave me a very textbook answer, but it came across as uninteresting advice to me. I think cinema is about sometimes having failures and distorted parts."

Director Koreeda chose something different instead of the correct answer. Choices that could be wrong, could backtrack, and were sometimes twisted. He unfolded a story AI cannot write through the humanoid.

Dispatch recently met with director Hirokazu Koreeda. We heard the questions he harbored in "Lamb in a Box."

◆ "If a dead person were to return"

"Lamb in a Box" is a story about a couple who lost their child in an accident. A humanoid that resembles the dead child enters their home. It depicts the process of the family becoming one with a humanoid that looks exactly like the dead child.

It is his first original screenplay he wrote himself in 8 years since "Our Little Sister." He came up with the story after seeing an article about services spreading that recreate deceased people using generative AI.

His personal experience was also added to this. He said, "It's a personal matter, but my father passed away suddenly one day" and "If he appeared before me again, there are things I want to tell him, and I kept thinking about it."

"(No matter how much science advances) I cannot bring a dead person back to life just because I want to. But everyone has the feeling of wishing someone were by their side right now, don't they? I tried to unfold the story starting from that universal emotion."

◆ "What only humans can do"

His second question while making the film was "What can only humans do?" That question led to "What is the last humanity that humans possess?"

"I thought enjoying the process is something only humans can do. Another is imagination. Like overlapping a child with an olive tree in the film. I wanted to unfold such stories in cinema."

He verified the answer to his question through ChatGPT. "I normally don't use generative AI at all. But a producer said 'Isn't it strange not to try it when making a film like this?' and told me to try it," he said.

Director Koreeda submitted his screenplay to ChatGPT and received feedback. AI gave a textbook answer: "If you dig deeper into the mother's character, the child's anguish will come alive."

He felt emptiness in that seemingly correct answer.

"If I wrote it that way, it would become a correct screenplay, but it seemed like all screenplays would be the same. The relationships in the film also need to fail and become distorted, but there was none of that. I thought I should gather human strengths and make films going forward. I intend to end my relationship with ChatGPT. Ha ha."

◆ The 7-year-old humanoid

Bringing up the humanoid story was an unexpected choice on his part. Yet placing a child at its center was very much Koreeda. He has consistently drawn remarkable scenes from children with limited acting experience.

Rimu Kuwaki, who plays the humanoid "Kakeru," was no exception. Kakeru is a being that resembles humans but is not complete. The character cannot be too human, nor too mechanical.

How did Director Koreeda direct Rimu Kuwaki, born in 2016? He emphasized, "The most important thing with children is to wait. Never rush them."

"When they have concentration, they show really good acting. But sometimes they suddenly fall asleep while filming. In those moments, I'd say, like Kakeru, 'Rimu is charging.' The most important thing is creating an environment where you can wait for the child."

He left the acting to the actor. Rimu Kuwaki revealed, "The director explained about the humanoid and just said 'Do it your way.' I acted with the mindset of just trying, and through that process I think I came to understand the character."

◆ The invisible

At the film's end, Kakeru leaves the parents' side. What remains is only the couple. Director Koreeda explained, "The overall sense of the first half of the film is 'visible but absent.' The second half is flipped to 'absent but present.'"

The humanoids create their own new home in the forest. Koreeda contained a certain future in that scene. Forest, humans, and humanoid. A space where disparate things coexist.

"The couple doesn't stay there and ends up leaving. Because their ways of life differ. Just as a child grows and becomes something greater than their parents, when AI surpasses humans, I wanted to show that overlapped."

The future of the couple Autone (Haruka Ayase) and Kensuke (Daigo) is, in a way, solitary. A world where the forest they cannot enter keeps growing. That tree is beautiful and yet a threat.

Still, the film does not end in despair. At the place where Kakeru vanishes, the couple imagines him. While looking at the olive tree they planted thinking of Kakeru.

Director Koreeda said, "Someone once told me my films have both the perspective of the dead and the perspective of children, and I agree. But what's different about this film is that the dead person is namely the child."

"I depicted a story where the dead and the child become one and enter the family, and that family regenerates. So I don't think of this work as science fiction. I simply thought of it as a story about a dead person returning. To the child who returned, the parents wanted to show the process of still making mistakes and falling over, page after page."

Meanwhile, "Lamb in a Box" was invited to the 79th Cannes Film Festival, where it made its world premiere. It opens domestically on the 10th. Running time is 126 minutes.

<Photo provided by Media Castle>