Hayao Miyazaki Tells Video Game Makers What He Thinks of Their Characters Made with Artificial Intelligence: “I’m Utterly Disgusted. This Is an Insult to Life Itself”

For a young per­son in an ani­ma­tion-based field, the oppor­tu­ni­ty to share new work with direc­tor Hayao Miyaza­ki must feel like a gold­en oppor­tu­ni­ty.

This may still hold true for Nobuo Kawaka­mi, the chair­man of Dwan­go, a Japan­ese telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions and media com­pa­ny, but not for the rea­sons he like­ly antic­i­pat­ed at the start of the above video.

The sub­ject of their dis­cus­sion is a com­put­er gen­er­at­ed ani­mat­ed mod­el whose arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence caus­es it to move by squirm­ing on its head. Its cre­ators haven’t invest­ed it with any par­tic­u­lar per­son­al­i­ty traits or sto­ry­line, but its flayed appear­ance and tor­tu­ous move­ments sug­gest it’s unlike­ly to be board­ing Miyazaki’s mag­i­cal cat bus any time soon.

Even with­out an explic­it nar­ra­tive, the model’s poten­tial should be evi­dent to any­one who’s ever sat through the final-reel res­ur­rec­tion of a hor­ri­bly maimed, pre­sumed-dead ter­ror­iz­er of scant­i­ly clad young ladies.

The model’s grotesque squirm­ings could also be an asset to zom­bie video games, as Kawaka­mi excit­ed­ly points out.

Let us remem­ber that Miyazaki’s films are root­ed not in gross-out effects, but redemp­tion, a rev­er­ence for nature, and respect for chil­dren and all liv­ing things.

The mas­ter watch­es the demon­stra­tion with­out com­ment, then dis­pens­es with tra­di­tion­al Japan­ese eti­quette in favor of some strong­ly word­ed med­i­cine that leaves no doubt as to what he real­ly thought of Dwan­go’s arti­fi­cial­ly intel­li­gent wretch:

“I am utter­ly dis­gust­ed… I strong­ly feel that this is an insult to life itself.”  

(At this point, you real­ly should watch the video, to hear Miyaza­k­i’s open­ing state­ment, about a dis­abled friend for whom even a sim­ple high-five is a painful phys­i­cal exer­tion.)

Poor Kawaka­mi-san! Uncer­e­mo­ni­ous­ly shamed in front of his col­leagues by a nation­al trea­sure, he doesn’t push back. All he can offer is some­thing along the lines of “We didn’t mean any­thing by it”—a state­ment that seems cred­i­ble.

The Amer­i­can pres­i­dent may be into dehu­man­iz­ing those with dis­abil­i­ties, but the Dwan­go crew’s heads were like­ly occu­pied with boy­ish visions of a thrilling­ly grue­some zom­bie apoc­a­lypse.

It’s a harsh, but impor­tant mes­sage for Miyaza­ki to have got­ten across. Dwan­go is respon­si­ble for cre­at­ing a lot of online games. In oth­er words, they hold con­sid­er­able sway over impres­sion­able youth.

Stu­dio Ghi­b­li co-founder Toshio Suzu­ki grants Kawaka­mi and his col­leagues an oppor­tu­ni­ty to save face, ask­ing what the team’s goals are.

“We’d like to build a machine that can draw pic­tures like humans do,” one shell­shocked-look­ing young man responds.

What, like, Hen­ri Mail­larde­t’s automa­ton from 1810? While I can imag­ine such a con­trap­tion show­ing up in one of Miyazaki’s steam-punk-fla­vored adven­tures, the hush that greets this state­ment all but screams “wrong answer!”

What will this encounter lead to?

The release of an online game in which one scores points by hideous­ly dis­mem­ber­ing the ani­mat­ed form of direc­tor Hayao Miyaza­ki?

Or a new­found sen­si­tiv­i­ty, in which cool tech­no­log­i­cal advances are viewed through a lens of actu­al human expe­ri­ence?

Only time will tell.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

The Essence of Hayao Miyaza­ki Films: A Short Doc­u­men­tary About the Human­i­ty at the Heart of His Ani­ma­tion

Soft­ware Used by Hayao Miyazaki’s Ani­ma­tion Stu­dio Becomes Open Source & Free to Down­load

Hayao Miyaza­ki Meets Aki­ra Kuro­sawa: Watch the Titans of Japan­ese Film in Con­ver­sa­tion (1993)

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is an author, illus­tra­tor, the­ater mak­er and Chief Pri­ma­tol­o­gist of the East Vil­lage Inky zine.  Fol­low her @AyunHalliday.