Oscar-nominated screenwriter Paul Schrader thinks that writers should have no issue using AI to generated story ideas.

Paul Schrader has been in the industry long enough to have helped form the New Hollywood, see the rise of the blockbuster, the indie takeover of the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, and everything in between. Now, as AI continues to make its move on the business, Paul Schrader has some thoughts: he loves it!

Paul Schrader recently took to Facebook to declare his support for AI, particularly when it comes to developing story ideas. “I’M STUNNED. I just asked chatgpt for “an idea for Paul Schrader film.” Then Paul Thomas Anderson. Then Quentin Tarantino. Then Harmony Korine. Then Ingmar Bergman. Then Rossellini. Lang. Scorsese. Murnau. Capra. Ford. Speilberg. Lynch. Every idea chatgpt came up with (in a few seconds) was good. And original. And fleshed out. Why should writers sit around for months searching for a good idea when AI can provide one in seconds?” If only Paul Schrader had had access to AI when coming up with Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist — at the very least it could have given him a better title…

Replying to a follower if he was actually serious about the support of AI, Paul Schrader confirmed, “Very serious. You want a 90 page script about a firefighter who has [lost] a child and must risk his life to save another child. Ask. I just did.” It seemed only obvious to punch Paul Schrader’s prompt into ChatGPT just to see where it would lead. Expectedly, I got a story that centered around the themes of isolation and redemption, with a tone designed to be bleak and an ending designed to be ambiguous, all of which we’ve seen in Paul Schrader films at one point or another.

And while that’s certainly a shortcut, it’s really only giving you an idea of what a script by someone might sound like. Whenever you plug in someone’s name in the above scenario, it’s a lazy parody that plays off of tropes and recycles ideas. Using Martin Scorsese, ChatGPT literally told me, “Think Taxi Driver meets Goodfellas”, while using David Lynch pointed to a story that “could center around a small, seemingly idyllic town in the Pacific Northwest, where a bizarre, almost dreamlike phenomenon begins to unravel the lives of its residents.” Yes, very clever…

But what do we even do with this? Does a writer as brilliant as Paul Schrader really need to put their own name into an AI machine and ask it to tell him what one of his movies might sound like? Septuagenarian or not, Schrader hasn’t lost his marbles to that point, has he?

Do you support Paul Schrader’s method of using AI? What do you see the benefit being, if any, when it comes to writing?