Never underestimate the terrifying power of an off-the-cuff comment from Tom Hanks.
That, at least, is the lesson learned recently by Toronto-born computer-graphics guru Gary Mundell, who watched his world tilt and swivel after the Hollywood superstar dumped on the hyper-realistic virtual characters that Mundell's team created for the film Final Fantasy -- The Spirits Within, released a couple weeks ago.
To be clear, Hanks didn't exactly criticize the characters in the sci-fi, digitally cast adventure movie. Nor did he quibble with Mundell's high-tech artistry in making the almost-lifelike actors. What Hanks did do was express concern that someday these synthespians will put real people out of work.
To quote, Hanks confided to The New York Times: "I am very troubled by it. But it's coming down, man. It's going to happen. And I'm not sure what actors can do about it."
Three lines from Hanks, and all hell breaks loose. The Screen Actors Guild pipes up, adding their worries that soon Hollywood will be a digitized wasteland, with no heart, no soul. In a matter of a day, the synthetic reality of Mundell's motion-picture movie star became the pop-cult issue of the moment.
Mundell, the Honolulu-based computer-graphics supervisor at Square USA, which made the $115-million (U.S.) film, finds the controversy "entertaining," but adds, "I think it's a lot of hype."
In an interview last week at software-maker Alias Wavefront's headquarters in downtown Toronto, Mundell said it was remarkable to watch the almost hysterical reaction of the media to the spectre of a digital actor like the film's heroine, Dr. Aki Ross -- a beautiful brunette with feminine attributes to blow your mind -- ruling the roost in Hollywood.
"I don't agree with it, and I'm not quite sure why there's so much controversy," he continued. "I guess it's just because there's so much unknown.
"But there's more than enough room for everybody to play this game. I don't feel these virtual characters are going to be taking jobs away. The whole point of our film was to basically bring a new form of entertainment to the masses."
Mundell, 40, laughs at the thought that his photo-realistic computer characters will ever replace such A-list actors as Hanks, Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise or Penelope Cruz. His reason is simple: Computer-generated faces don't look like they've been lived in (at least not yet).
Shortly after Hanks blurted out his thoughts, conjecture began in some corners that the Aki Ross cartuman could be cast in other movies, and even get product endorsements. The thinking went that digital actors would be far more pliable than flesh-and-blood stars, who don't always do a producer's bidding, and can demand multimillions per role.
Mundell laughs at that suggestion. "Dr. Ross was the closest thing to a lifelike person I believe a studio has been able to create yet," says Mundell, who used Alias Wavefront's 3-D software, Maya, to create such things as Aki's Wella Balsam hair, which consisted of 60,000 individually controlled strands (and sucked up 25 per cent of the film's processing power).
"But she still doesn't come close to equating to a real person," he adds. "I think everybody likes to think this is what's going to happen because it follows suit with the licensing and marketing of athletes and movie stars. Some people think this is some kind of natural progression. But . . .it's not the same kind of quality or substance that someone of Hanks's skill brings to the screen."
Within two years, however, Mundell sees virtual actors doing some of the so-called dirty jobs that most actors won't miss, like hard-to-execute stunts or certain love scenes. "We will replace real live actors, but we'll replace them in a genre of filmmaking that these actors would not have gone near in the first place.
"We will see virtual actors used more, not for your lead character, but for crowd scenes, for second-string actors. We're simply opening up the industry for telling new stories that normally we wouldn't see."
Star Wars creator George Lucas agrees with Mundell's assessment. Lucas, who used computer-generated Jar Jar Binks in Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace,also says the concern is misplaced. "I don't think I would ever use the computer to create a human character," he told The New York Times. "It just doesn't work. You need actors to do that."
Nevertheless, the groundswell of reaction has been a blessing for Mundell and the $50-million computer-generation studio that Square USA recently built in Hawaii. Overall, Final Fantasy -- based on a video game, and set in 2065, when millions of aliens attack Earth and infect humans with a killer virus -- got lukewarm reviews. But the buzz the movie received from Hanks's musing was worth its weight in gold.
Perhaps the controversy over Final Fantasy is just the lull before the storm. Next year, Al Pacino plays a movie producer in a film called Simone, touted as the first synthespian satire. Pacino's character is weary of his leading lady and her temper tantrums, and replaces the actress with a digital version.
Next May, there's also another instalment of Lucas's Star Wars franchise. Officially top secret, you can bet it will include wall-to-wall digital imagery.
Mundell says the advantage of the digital age in moviemaking is that "we're not limited to anything, not limited to an actor's schedule, likes or dislikes. We're in complete control outside of the voice acting. It allows us to tell any story we want without limitations."
The disadvantage, he adds candidly, is that while characters like the buxom Aki Ross are believable, they're not real. "We're not going to get the computer," he deadpans, "to read Shakespeare."
Gayle MacDonald