Martin Scorsese Is Under Fire For His AI Endorsement

BusinessHollywood & EntertainmentMartin Scorsese Is Under Fire For His AI EndorsementByHannah Abraham,Contributor.Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Hannah Abraham covers entertainment, culture and business.Follow AuthorJun 10, 2026, 12:26am EDTJun 10, 2026, 12:26am EDTNEW YORK, NEW YORK - OCTOBER 10: Martin Scorsese attends the conversation with Martin Scorsese and Jafar Panahi during the 63rd New York Film Festival at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center on October 10, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Dominik Bindl/Getty Images for FLC)Getty Images for FLCMartin Scorsese might think AI is (meme reference) absolute cinema. The iconic director has spent decades building a reputation as a staunch defender of human artistry. This week, he is defending himself from the people who used to agree with him.Earlier this month, the 83-year-old announced he had signed on as an adviser and partner to Black Forest Labs, a Germany-based AI startup specialising in text-to-image generation. The announcement came alongside a promotional video in which Scorsese described a shot he wanted to visualise, entered it into the company's FLUX generative AI software, and watched it produce images matching his description. The response from the film industry was swift and, in several cases, unprintable in full.What Scorsese Said About The AI PartnershipScorsese framed the collaboration as a practical pre-production tool as opposed to a creative replacement. "For 70 years, I’ve been creating my own storyboards. There’s always been this problem of how do you communicate what you see in your head to your cast and crew," he said in the Black Forest Labs video. "Now with this tool, I can share what I’m visualising more clearly and efficiently to my creative team — the production designer, art designer, and cinematographer — for them to build on to enrich cinematic intelligence." He added that during pre-production, "time costs money...