Where Hollywood Stands on AI Endorsements: Boots Riley and Kane Parsons Push Back on Scorsese

On June 3, 2026, Sorry to Bother You director Boots Riley publicly criticized Martin Scorsese's decision to join AI firm Black Forest Labs as an adviser. Within hours, Backrooms director Kane Parsons told Variety in a separate interview that using AI "defeats the purpose" of filmmaking entirely. The two responses landed on the same day and from opposite ends of a career spectrum.

The two reactions followed Scorsese's announcement that he had joined Black Forest Labs as an adviser to help shape the company's visual intelligence work. Scorsese said he uses the company's FLUX model to communicate his visual intentions to his cinematographer, production designer, and art director. Riley and Parsons responded not to that workflow claim but to the act of lending a name to the AI industry at this moment.

What Riley Said

Riley, who released I Love Boosters via Neon on May 22, 2026 without using AI tools, drew a precise line between private use and public advocacy. "To b clear, my vitriol is not about him using it, I'd likely simply sneer at that in private," he posted on social media. "It's about him using his cache 2 promote this and attempt to push the industry toward it."

Riley also questioned the technology's record against its funding. "They need him," he wrote. "1 Trillion spent on generative AI & it's not saving anyone or changing film yet." On Scorsese's situation specifically, he added: "at 83, they gave his family a gang of money (they throw tens of millions left&right) he wanted the income stream 4 them & feels like 'AI' will fall on its face anyway, so he doesnt give a fuck."

What Parsons Said

Parsons, director of the Backrooms YouTube horror series that grew into a feature, took an unambiguous position. "If I could snap my fingers and make generative AI disappear forever, I probably would," he told Variety. "Creatively, I get no enjoyment from using those tools. It defeats the purpose entirely."

Parsons did leave one door open. He said he is interested in examining AI as artistic subject matter in future work, studying what its iconography represents culturally. What he rejected was using AI as a production tool. At 20 years old, Parsons is among the youngest directors in Hollywood with a major festival profile.

The Generational Pattern That Isn't

The standard framing of Hollywood and new technology positions older directors as skeptics and younger ones as adopters. The Scorsese case fits one side of that picture. At 83, he has embraced AI as a communication tool, just as he previously adopted 3D filmmaking and digital age reversal effects.

But the resistance is running younger, not older. Riley (54) and Parsons (20) are pushing back, while directors like Gareth Edwards and Steven Soderbergh have been among the more vocal advocates for AI as a production tool. The divide is not generational. It is philosophical, and it cuts across ages and career stages in both directions.

The Celebrity Endorsement Question

Riley's core argument was not about what AI does to filmmaking. It was about what a director's name does for AI companies at a moment when the industry is still negotiating rules around the technology.

His framing treats celebrity advisory roles as a form of market legitimization, distinct from how directors actually work. Whether attaching a famous name to an AI firm is an endorsement of the technology or simply a paid workflow relationship is the question Riley and Parsons forced into the open on June 3. Other directors at AI FILMS Studio are navigating the same question on their own terms, deciding how openly to discuss the tools they use and what role public advocacy should play in their work.

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Sources

Variety | Deadline | The Wrap