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Turkish studio Spongeworthy's AI-generated feature film "A Woman Asleep" has been selected for the Main Competition of the 36th FilmFestival Cottbus, becoming the first AI-generated feature to enter the main competition of an established international film festival.
Directed by artist and filmmaker Vikki Bardot, also known as Gizem Avcioglu, the 80-minute English-language production is based on an original, semi-autobiographical screenplay and uses artificial intelligence throughout its visual and narrative approach.
Rather than serving only as a production tool, artificial intelligence is used as a cinematographic medium that ties into the film's exploration of alienation and technology-centered detachment in modern society.
The film is narrated through an AI-generated clone of Bardot's own voice, while its visuals were created using models that the director trained and customized herself. The final feature was edited down from a pool of around 50,000 individual shots, with the production process taking two years to complete.
Bardot is described as one of the few female filmmakers working with artificial intelligence at feature-film length.
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Co-produced and co-written with Alkan Avcioglu, "A Woman Asleep" takes inspiration from Georges Perec's 1967 novel "A Man Asleep" and its 1974 screen adaptation.
The essayistic film, which marks Bardot's debut, brings together fiction, memory and reflection while examining the sense of detachment associated with a technology-centered contemporary society.
Discussing the film, FilmFestival Cottbus director Bernd Buder pointed to the paradox of technological saturation and alienation. "Constantly informed yet deeply alienated," he noted, "A Woman Asleep exposes the hazards of our hyper-connected society with analytical sharpness, personal intimacy, and steady narrative poise."
The selection places the Turkish production in the Main Competition of the festival's 36th edition while also marking a first for an AI-generated feature within the main competitive section of an established international film festival.
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