AI for Indie Filmmakers: Faster, Cheaper, Lonelier

The technology is opening doors—but at what cost?

Brad Tangonan short film Murmuray opens with a Filipino man walking through a tropical backyard, approaching a shrine at a starfruit tree. A gust of wind knocks over the shrine. He trips, hits his head, and awakens in a misty forest where a woman with a clay mask stands over him, sword in hand.

Mom? he asks.

This could be any independent film. But here is the twist: Tangonan made it entirely using AI through Google Flow Sessions.

The Promise

AI is a facilitator. I am still making all the creative decisions.

The argument is compelling: AI tools allowed him to tell a family story he otherwise could not afford to tell. No crew, no expensive equipment—just Gemini, Nano Banana Pro, and Veo.

The same story played out across ten filmmakers in Google five-week cohort. Some made hyperreal visuals; others explored philosophical themes about AI itself. None felt like AI slop.

The Backlash

But here is where it gets complicated.

Guillermo del Toro said he would rather die than use generative AI. James Cameron called the idea of generating actors and emotions horrifying. Werner Herzog said AI films have no soul.

They are not wrong to worry. The same tools that empower indie filmmakers also threaten to erase jobs and creativity, smothering everything under an avalanche of low-effort content.

The Real Question

The debate is not whether AI belongs in filmmaking—it is what kind of filmmaking survives when the industry pushes speed and scale over quality.

Some artists will use AI to make something personal, something that matters. Others will pump out slop. The technology does not care. The artist has to.

It is very easy to be angry with AI as a concept in the machine, but it is harder to be angry with someone that made something personal.

The future of indie film is not about rejecting AI or embracing it blindly. It is about choosing to make something that matters—AI or no AI.