James Lamont and Jon Foster, the screenwriting duo whose credits include Paddington in Peru and Cartoon Network’s The Amazing World of Gumball, have teamed up for the script to Critterz, a new A.I.-assisted animated feature, which will be pitching to buyers at the upcoming Cannes Film Market.
Nik Kleverov, co-founder of A.I. production studio Native Foreign, is directing as well as producing Critterz together with Chad Nelson, a creative strategist at OpenAI, and Allan Niblo and James Richardson of London-based Vertigo Films.
The film is pitched as the first mainstream commercial family feature created with A.I. integrated throughout the entire production pipeline.
According to the official pitch, the film follows “an anxious but brave little woodland creature who unites with a group of eccentric outcasts — each with their own peculiar quirks and hidden strengths — on a high-stakes quest to find her long-lost brother.”
In a statement, Kleverov said Critterz aimed to capture “the wonder of the ‘80s fantasy movies I grew up on — the scrappy, adventurous spirit of The Goonies and the mythic, emotional scope of The NeverEnding Story…combined with the scale of early Star Wars.”
AGC International has picked up sales rights worldwide and will be screening first-look footage of Critterz to buyers in Cannes.
Executive producers on the film are Pascal Breton, Lionel Uzan, Jane Moore, Stuart Ford and Aghi Koh.
The Cannes Film Festival has banned films that use artificial intelligence as a principal authoring tool from participating in its main competition, although the technology is permitted for use in specific technical processes involved in filmmaking. But the Cannes Film Market is taking a more agnostic view as companies and creators around the world experiment with A.I. technology to shape or create features.
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