AMC Theatres’ about-face on screening an AI-created animated short that had won a film festival award was one more eye-opener in a new year filled with them. The chain had been scheduled to run the short film Thanksgiving Day as part of its preshow ad bloc, the startup outfit Frame Forward AI Animated Film Fest says. But execs at AMC claimed they hadn’t been consulted by the firm that does the bookings, and now that they knew, they were shutting it down.
AI is hardly a huge bogeyman to theater owners; in fact, the coming glut could even help them. But the Adam Aron-led company grasped a fundamental truth of doing business in Hollywood, circa 2026: Wade into AI waters at your peril.
The number of AI studios blanketing Hollywood, along with the VC dollars to power them, is increasing at an astonishing rate. Hollywood-focused video-generation platform Runway AI…
