Japan’s Kore-eda explores AI’s role in grief in Cannes contender

CANNES, France, May 17 (Reuters) – If a couple loses a child, would it be ethical to use AI to try to recreate the child if it eases their grief? ​And what happens when that AI decides it has its ‌own interests beyond the family that it was meant to console?

These are the questions posed by Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda, whose Cannes Film Festival entry, “Sheep in the Box,” imagines a near‑future in which technology offers a way to comfort ‌the ​bereaved.

The 2018 winner of the festival’s top ⁠prize said the film ⁠was inspired by his encounter with a Chinese entrepreneur who was developing AI systems capable of simulating deceased people.

“These resurrected dead were carrying on conversations, not just reliving the past, but continuing ​to build new relationships and accumulate shared experiences,” Kore-eda told a press conference on Sunday.

“I felt there would definitely be people ⁠who would want to use a service ⁠like this,” said the director known for such ​quietly observed family dramas as “Shoplifters” and “Like Father, Like Son”.

That prospect, he said, ​also led to an ethical question: “Is it really acceptable for ‌the living to manipulate the existence of the dead however they please?”

The film follows a grieving couple, Otone and Kensuke Komoto, played by Haruka Ayase and Daigo Yamamoto, respectively, who turn to a ⁠humanoid child built from data and memories of their deceased son to deal with their loss.

Initially hesitant, the father warms to the life-like robot, ⁠who becomes integrated into ‌the couple’s lives. But he then befriends other ⁠humanoids, posing the risk the couple will be ​abandoned ‌all over again.

Critics have generally been unconvinced. The ​Hollywood Reporter, alluding ⁠to the film’s cryptic title, said it was “thematically woolly” and industry magazine IndieWire described it as “emotionally stunted”.

“Sheep in the Box” is one of 22 films in competition for the festival’s top prize, which will be awarded on May 23.

(Reporting by Miranda Murray and Francesca Halliwell; editing ​by Barbara Lewis)