Spoiler alert: AI in cinema 'just a tool, won’t replace actors and human beings'

To display this content from YouTube, you must enable advertisement tracking and audience measurement. One of your browser extensions seems to be blocking the video player from loading. To watch this content, you may need to disable it on this site. Cover image: © France 24 05:24 Issued on: 08/09/2026 - 16:11Modified: 08/09/2026 - 16:17 Eve Irvine is pleased to welcome film producer Lahoucine Grimich. He challenges the prevailing narrative that cinema is an industry in existential crisis. While acknowledging that viewing habits have dramatically shifted since the pandemic, he argues that streaming platforms, public support and theatrical exhibition are not competing forces. As demonstrated in the French model, they form parts of an interconnected financing ecosystem in which cinema can adapt without ever abandoning the big screen. He frames filmmaking as a form of cultural sovereignty: societies need films not simply as entertainment, but to recognise themselves and to create what he calls “new imaginaries.” Keywords for this article