Marc Isaacs’ Synthetic Sincerity blurs documentary and AI

Marc Isaacs’ new film presents the provocative claim that an AI research lab licensed his entire quarter-century of documentaries — from Lift and The Curious World of Frinton-on-Sea to Philip and His Seven Wives — to extract authentic human emotions. The picture takes its name from the lab, the University of Southern England, a detail Isaacs later admits is fictional; he says he has not personally been approached to license his work, though he has "heard about people who have." Ablikim Rahman, the chef-owner of the Uyghur restaurant Etles, appears in the film as an avatar after being photographed by the supposed AI team.

Rather than trying to trick viewers, Isaacs and his co-writer Adam Ganz use planned fiction to reach places straightforward documentaries often cannot. Their method — non-actors performing scenarios and dialogue they devised — follows on from The Filmmaker’s House and This Blessed Plot, which similarly recast real figures as fictional characters.

marc isaacs, synthetic sincerity, ai lab, documentaries, adam ganz, ablikim rahman, etles, avatar, non actors, planned fiction