The State Of Cinema, 2025

Or How AI Cannot Measure Life in Coffee Spoons

The Art of Self-Defense on Shotdeck

Before I had the chance to act in a film. Before I found the incredibly thrilling joy of screenwriting. Before cinematography and editing became my two favorite “hobbies.”

Before FilmStack grew my love for cinema beyond measure…

I had two means through which I saw the world:

poetry and psychology.

I remember exactly what desk in high school I was sitting in when I read Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Ozymandias for the first time.

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

I remember the Love Song T.S. Eliot wrote and how a life measured by coffee spoons became a window into how I would more or less measure my own.

For I have known them all already, known them all:

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

And though it has now been overused to the point of losing all meaning, I remember how Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s How Do I Love Thee? played like a song in my heart I so desperately wanted to sing.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach…I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life…

Poetry is how I first made sense of the world when the world didn’t make any sense.

It offered me windows into different worlds and as the poet Pat Schneider asks,

What is more generous than a window?

To me cinema is the ultimate window into the world because it is for all intents and purposes the clearest depiction of our world. Gathering up all artforms that speak to the senses and crafting them into a truly singular cinematic experience. But the best films push this further still into the realm of the philosophical and psychological or the unseen, intangible parts of our existence.

For personal reasons in high school I started studying this unseen, oftentimes unspoken knowledge through the subject of psychology (this was before it became a social media trend) and devoured any good old fashion textbook or anything written by a psychologist I could get my hands on. (Trauma and Recovery by Judith Lewis Herman should be required reading.)

So I’m using a slightly different approach when it comes to Ted Hope’s Challenge on the 20 aspects of where we are now in the cinema industries. (Of which I only have 7.)

1) Because I do not think I can give a practical diagnosis better than has already been done by others and 2) Because I think until we understand something about the psychology (and lack of poetry) behind where we currently are, will forever miss the “big picture” of cinema’s role in the world at large.

As I discussed in my previous post, what FilmStack is building on here is a new way of approaching knowledge, one that puts humans back at the center.

And I’m still using the two points Ted made in his diagnosis as an entry point:

1. We are in Cinema’s Fourth Great Disruption — and it is Utter Chaos.

2. AI inevitability brings jitters, confusion, and hesitation.

Because I think this is ultimately the question at the forefront of this “disruption” we are experiencing in the world and especially in the cinematic industries:

What is humanity’s value?

Are we only worth the amount in our bank account?

Are we valuable only to the extent of the amount of money we make others?

And are we worth stopping certain companies’ uncapped exponential growth if it is costing all of us the connection to our humanity?

I am writing this with 28 cents in my bank account and I find my words no less worthy or valuable than someone with 2 billion, but the problem is I am alone in this assessment. Because we have attached wisdom and knowledge to a number in an account or worse - a projected number in a company’s hypothetical “earnings.”

The disconnect from what is actually real or what actually matters is palpably felt by us all but we are hesitant to question it to the point of actual change, because we live in a world that has taken from us our ability to think for ourselves and it has left us with a present reality that seeks only to distract and never to enlighten or enrich.

Which is not a world where true cinema (or humanity) can thrive.

So let’s take a quick look at the “current state of things” and better yet the ways in which people (especially on FilmStack) are combating the “problems.”

1. We’ve Literally Lost Our Grip on Reality

The digital era shifted our physical experience to a purely mental one. This coupled with the loss of physical media (tangible evidence anchoring us to the present) and the disintegration of communal places, also known as third spaces, of which theaters are a vital factor, have caused us to all but completely lose our connection with not only each other but with our own humanity.

But physical media is back on rise as is the understanding of the importance of third spaces.

But given recent events, I’ve been feeling pretty iffy about my reliance on big tech companies. I’m starting to think inventors really popped off when they came up with “things we can hold in our hands.” I used to have a DVD collection and an entire book of CDs that I let slip away over time. Now I’m slowly starting to rebuild my physical media collection—and seeing many others do the same.

-Kate Lindsay, Physical media is officially back

The thing about third places—wide-ranging as they are in character—is that they breed culture in a way that would be impossible without them. -Colby Dollof, The Third Space Revival

2. We Have Lost Our Ability To Think (Not Just Critically But At All)

Students who leaned on AI remembered less and felt less connected to their work. Some didn’t even want to take ownership of large sections of “their” essays. Many couldn’t quote what they had “written” days later. The more the machine did, the less the brain did. The researchers called it cognitive debt: the mind’s muscle shrinks when we stop asking it to carry weight.

We are exchanging our cognitive capacity for time.

(…)

Even if all AI progress stopped today, the systems we already have are more proficient than the average person at most basic writing, summarizing, and synthesis tasks. If we do not act, we will see a great cognitive divide unfold.

And the majority could end up on the wrong side, outsourcing struggle, cognitive capacity, and accumulating cognitive debt.

-

Sinéad Bovell

, The Great Cognitive Divide

This is where concepts like

Dario Llinares

’s Theatrical Film Education Plan comes in to counteract our passive viewership and disconnected relationship to the world.

To create “cognitive friction” in our minds once again.

The auditorium…remained the physical and conceptual centre of both educational and social life…This advocacy of collective spectatorship gave the experience a kind of cultural gravity. Around that centre, our engagement with realism, formalism, auteur theory, genre, semiotics, psychoanalysis - all the theoretical frameworks we were absorbing - felt anchored. - Dario Llinares

Cinemas should take the lead in creating a new generation of viewers who don’t just treat films as passive “content,” but who understand the historical, aesthetic, and political dimensions of cinema. This isn’t a nostalgic plea - it’s a pragmatic vision. - Dario Llinares

3. We Are Living In A Society of Addicts.

Last year, Ted Gioia gave a crucial assessment on The State Of Culture:

The fastest growing sector of the culture economy is distraction. Or call it scrolling or swiping or wasting time or whatever you want. But it’s not art or entertainment, just ceaseless activity.

Our brain rewards these brief bursts of distraction. The neurochemical dopamine is released, and this makes us feel good—so we want to repeat the stimulus.

This is a familiar model for addiction.

Only now it is getting applied to culture and the creative world—and billions of people. They are unwitting volunteers in the largest social engineering experiment in human history.

from Gioia’s State of Culture article

Jon Stahl

consider this my contribution to comedy…

Maximus: Are You Not Entertained??

The Modern Man: Nah, bro, I’m distracted.

This is crucial in understanding how we get people’s attention back; not just watching long-form narratives (feature films) but how we get them back into theaters because despite those with power who would say otherwise,

the theatrical experience is a vital component to the cinematic industry and society at large.

(edited add-in citation.) And this is the exact premise behind

Sophie

’s pitch to turn theaters into cultural gyms.

These industry problems reflect something bigger: our diminishing relationship with cultural fitness.

The ability to process complex narratives sours with each autoplay. Our capacity for sustained attention shrinks with every notification. Our shared reference points splinter into algorithm-driven bubbles. Our tolerance for ambiguity contracts as we sort entertainment into things we already know we'll like. Conspiracy theories replace nuanced understanding. Authoritarian movements flourish where narrative complexity once lived.

Don't mistake this for some snobby lament about lowbrow entertainment. I'm not talking about quoting Shakespeare or recognizing 1920s directors. Cultural fitness isn't knowing what—it's knowing how.

Cultural fitness thrives in identical ways [to physical fitness.] It requires spaces that optimize for focus rather than distraction, for complexity rather than simplification, for collective experience rather than isolated consumption. -Sophie, That Final Scene

4. We Became A Reactionary Society

Ironically this seems to be the only area where we’ve increased our emotional output, but it has distorted our vision, thinking, and ability to truly connect with one another and what someone is saying.

In the cinematic industry this looks like replacing critics with haters, or lovers.

This is where

Charlotte Simmons

concept of The New Film Criticism becomes key to counteracting such polarizing, binary “thinking.”

The new film criticism will create objective conversations out of subjective art. That’s the true power of subjectivity — not in allowing everyone to be “correct,” but in being unbound in its capacity to evoke. How, then, can limiting criticism to a matter of opinion be anything other than defeatist?

The new film criticism will not be about longform scores and judgements, and will not retreat into complacent subjectivity so as to avoid the challenge of discourse. No, it will have a conversation with the film — a conversation as objectively real, tangible, and critiqueable as the film itself — so as to spark even more conversation.

It will be a forest of diverse observation rather than two opposing bubbles of opinion.

And why posts like this one from Thomas Flight are so crucial in getting us to think carefully and to put us back in the bodies we have become so disconnected from.

To really appreciate a film or a work of art we have to give ourselves space to actually absorb it, process it, and think about it. After we’ve given ourselves that time, that’s often when our most thoughtful critiques, or interpretations will arise.

(…)

Film appreciation means understanding what a film is, and a movie is not just what happens during the running time of the film, it’s also the way that experience ferments inside you. Eat the meal. Let yourself digest it.

-

Thomas Flight

, A Casual Guide to Film Appreciation

5. We Mistook Progress and Profit for Innovation and Growth

This to me is the clearest sign the cinematic industries are a business producing goods to be sold and not art to be experienced. How can you work in the arts and not be on the pulse of what is happening in the world or constantly innovating the field in which you work?

The New 80% Rule in Culture by Ted Gioia

Today 80% of the movie business is built on old ideas—remakes, and spin-offs, and various other brand extensions. And we went from 80% new to 80% old in just a few years.

In Hollywood, even the names of the businesses are reboots. HBO’s name was changed to HBO Max. Then it became just Max. And now it embraces the HBO Max name again.

(…)

Pretending to change while staying the same is a plague in Hollywood. HBO actually has better credentials at innovation than most of its peers.

And the problem is far bigger than just the movie industry.

This is like a chess problem where the goal isn’t winning, but getting back to your original position. -Ted Gioia

6. We Stopped Looking Outside For Answers

Which is another clear sign we aren’t letting artists run things because it is an artist’s job to constantly search both inside and outside ourselves.

The question isn't whether humans will work, but what kind of work humans do in the [Altman’s] ‘gentle singularity.’ It's not just art, and creativity isn't the only skill we'll need. Human work will live in Trades, Research, Art, Community, and Stewardship.

(…)

The “creator economy” accommodates 8 billion creators when what they’re creating is local community. Robots can make products, but humans still make the connections. It's about creating context for people to connect and experience things together. Coffee shops, bookstores, town squares, libraries, theaters — the "third spaces" where community happens.

Community-building is essentially the key point to learn from the creator economy and the audience forward ecosystem NonDē has been building on here and what

Ellis J. Sutton

and I, at

The Label

are actively case-studying.

7. We Forgot Cinema’s Power (For Better Or Worse)

Her (2013) — The Merger of Hollywood and Silicon Valley by

Dane Benko

Certainly I could make the case that Avatar was the merger between Hollywood and Silicon Valley, with its embrace of digital technology and virtualized filmmaking. It even adopted Silicon Valley’s techno-critical aspects about “extractive” versus “data” industries…

But Her was the point when the medium of film started selling the world Silicon Valley’s foundational stories.

It’s important that it wasn’t even a studio film but rather a studio indie. Her aestheticized where Silicon Valley was going using Silicon Valley’s own logic, rational, and point of view. Her was when Hollywood became the official propaganda arm of Silicon Valley.

Director Spike Jonze, I suspect, would disagree. He shares with Dave Eggars that, “But behind the irony it’s all very human, right? That’s the double-irony, ironically” nonsense Gen X cursed us with, leaving us with an ‘open ending’ where the nature of Theodor and Samantha’s relationship is offered to audience to discuss and determine; but no, functionally this movie was a Kurzweillian fever dream set up to make us accept the premise even if we disagreed with the conclusion. The overall implied acceptance not “of our relationship to devices” but how would we maintain intimate relationships with our technology manufactured consent to Silicon Valley to go about engineering UX with these relationships in mind. Hence ChatGPT.

This is very different than 20th Century sci fi about our potential for relationships with android robots. For one thing, the devices are already here; for another thing, the relationship is framed as natural and grows organically, instead of being designed…it was the big breakout movie hit in which Silicon Valley was no longer ‘the tech industry’ but rather our American social hegemony. It was no longer “what we’re inventing” but “who we are,” “where we’re going” but “where we’ve arrived.”

It doesn’t matter if Theodor was left staring at the sky, wondering if Samantha was ever there. We’ve been trying to find a way out of her/Her’s world ever since.

Reading this reminded me of War Games and how it literally shaped government policy on computers:

Could something like this really happen? Could someone break into our most sensitive computers? The answer came back a week later: “Mr. President, the problem is much worse than you think.” That led not only to a significant revamp of how computer security was handled at the Defense Department, but also passage of an anti-hacking law that would eventually evolve into our current Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Clips of WarGames were shown during the congressional hearings where lawmakers debated the need for hacking legislation.

Which leads me to my closing thoughts:

I’m not interested in progress and I could care less about a company’s bottom line.

Give me the deeper questions in life. Give me meaning. Give me purpose.

And what is the purpose of AI?

To make us more productive?

To then do what?

To advance, advance, advance…

To where?

What world are they building with it when its biggest accomplishment seems to have been to further an unbelievably progressive detachment of humans from their humanity?

They keep saying “we can’t know where it’s all going just yet. only time will tell.” But I can tell you where it’s not going…its not going to a world inhabitable by humans. By authentic personal connection. By empathy. By joy. By transcendence.

When your main purpose is to gut us from our humanity for the sake of accumulating data or knowledge, what are you actually trying to build here?

What good is building a “digital superintelligence” when the human body remains caged to that dopamine hit factory you’ve put in our pockets.

I am so over knowledge for the sake of knowledge or progress for the sake of progress.

I’m not here for some ego stroke, I’m here to experience this life in all its gorgeous contradiction and limitation that I have personally overcome more times than I can count. And I am not still here in this body so that I can work towards a world where we have access to any type of knowledge and “data” and do not remember when the last time we made eye contact with someone was.

When we don’t remember the way our entire body comes alive in goosebumps and heart flutters when our hand brushes up against that someone we’ve had a crush on for like ever as we sit beside them in a darkened theater.

When we don’t remember the last time we thought we’d collapse from the weight of grief only to recall we are still here, living.

Human beings are defined by our limitation. For better or worse, it is a defining characteristic of being human. It’s what makes things like art such a transcendental experience because we KNOW what it is like to be in a body. To touch and feel this human condition we are all a part of. And you think that can be replaced with metal and electricity and a “digital superintelligence” that puffs up your own ego but leaves our humanity behind?

This is an industrialist, capitalistic mindset and it has got to go in building this new world of film.

Cinema reminds us of our human condition. What it’s like to exist in a body in this world, but it also allows us to feel what it means to transcend it. What it means to stay here when you feel like dying. To hold onto hope when you feel like all light is gone. To expand when you want to shrink. To keep going, when you want to give up.

We’ve numbed ourselves to the human experience with good reason - it can feel like an impossible existence right now, (and unfortunately a large part of this numbing was against our own will) but this numbing has cost us our knowledge of what being human is.

We villainized our emotional experience as if it weren’t the thing reminding us we’re still alive.

Cinema offers a visceral connection back into your body long enough to know that you are still here. The reason AI became a “superpower” and not simply an incredibly useful tool is because we are no longer thinking for ourselves or resonating with our own humanity and cinema is the entry point in which we get both these things back.

Curiosity, intuition, experience, imagination, courage, meaning, creativity, loss, grief, transcendence and awe are all elements of the human condition and art is simultaneously a summation of them and a means in which they are brought about.

It is inevitable in our inherent search for meaning to then attempt to place meaning upon that which we create for as humans it is a natural response to place our own sense of being into anything we encounter. And in this “technoscientific age” it is no different. For technology continues to captivate and influence all of our lives to various extents. But I think those who are quick to label artificial intelligence as “creative” or capable of producing “works of art” have a restricted understanding of what creativity and art are.

from my post, Gathered Thoughts on Artificial Intelligence and Human Creativity

Art is how we make sense of things beyond our comprehension, it is a repeated attempt at understanding our own humanity, and stems from our ingrained desire for deeper knowing. And I believe it is this deeper knowing that makes us intrinsically human.

Mr. Nobody on Shotdeck

Do I dare

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

- The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot

Nick Cave’s response to the question: “Considering human imagination the last piece of wilderness, do you think AI will ever be able to write a good song? ”

He says, and excuse my simplistic summation, that we listen to songs to make us feel certain things and that in the future AI will simply be able to map the individual mind and create songs tailored exclusively to our own particular mental algorithms, that can make us feel, with far more intensity and precision, whatever it is we want to feel.

But, I am not sure that this is all songs do.

Of course, we go to songs to make us feel something…but this is not all a song does. What a great song makes us feel is a sense of awe. There is a reason for this. A sense of awe is almost exclusively predicated on our limitations as human beings. It is entirely to do with our audacity as humans to reach beyond our potential.

It is perfectly conceivable that AI could produce a song as good as Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” for example, and that it ticked all the boxes required to make us feel what a song like that should make us feel…It is also feasible that AI could produce a song that makes us feel these same feelings, but more intensely than any human songwriter could do.

But, I don’t feel that when we listen to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” it is only the song that we are listening to. It feels to me, that what we are actually listening to is a withdrawn and alienated young man’s journey out of the small American town of Aberdeen — a young man who by any measure was a walking bundle of dysfunction and human limitation — a young man who had the temerity to howl his particular pain into a microphone and in doing so, by way of the heavens, reach into the hearts of a generation…

We are listening to Beethoven compose the Ninth Symphony while almost totally deaf…We are listening to Nina Simone stuff all her rage and disappointment into the most tender of love songs…

What we are actually listening to is human limitation and the audacity to transcend it.

Artificial Intelligence, for all its unlimited potential, simply doesn’t have this capacity.

How could it?

And this is the essence of transcendence. If we have limitless potential then what is there to transcend?

And therefore what is the purpose of the imagination at all.