Graphomaniac or masterpiece creator: a neural network has been developed to generate movie scripts.

Why are theaters today filled with dull movies? Where are the new “MimiNo,” “The Diamond Arm,” “Beware of Automobile”? The answer is simple: there are too few good screenwriters. Without a solid script, creating an engaging film is impossible. To aid the struggling film industry under the weight of mediocrity, science has come to the rescue. At MIPT - the leading technical university in the country - a virtual assistant powered by artificial intelligence has been developed for screenwriters.

Students from the Applied Mathematics and Computer Science School at MIPT have created a digital tool for generating scripts for biographical films. The program is named ScreenplayCraftAI and is available for public access on GitHub.

The neural network has already generated around a dozen biopics about the lives of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Sergei Korolev, Nikolai Vavilov, Ilya Mechnikov, Ivan Pavlov, and others. It must be noted that all the plots follow a predictable path: our hero is an inquisitive and hardworking teenager. Then, without sparing any effort, he dedicates his life to the pursuit of science. In the end, the great son of Russia leaves this sinful world, but his work lives on.

However, according to the developers' intent, unexpected plot twists remain the prerogative of followers of Danelya and Woody Allen. The program serves as an auxiliary tool for screenwriters; it provides some templates, saving time and simplifying the process. For instance, it takes the neural network only 20 minutes to generate text for a 40-minute episodic series. To determine whether this is merely an electronic hack or the author of future classics, we spoke with the developers of the AI assistant.

- Why did you decide to turn to cinema and screenwriting? It seems that creative tasks, especially storytelling, are the hardest for artificial intelligence.

- It all started when the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation announced a competition for scripts about prominent Russian scientists, - explains MIPT student Vladislav Smirnov, one of the program's developers. - Yuri Pavlovich Ammosov, who teaches a course on "Managing Technological Innovations" at MIPT, suggested working on the task of generating scripts. I believe MIPT has significantly eased this task for the ministry. Of course, modern AI systems are still imperfect, but large language models (like ChatGPT or YandexGPT - on which the virtual assistant “Alice” is based) can generate a good foundation for solving creative challenges.

- It is often said that the main issue with texts generated by AI is that, despite possessing encyclopedic knowledge, the model cannot filter it through personal experiences and subjective feelings. And that is precisely what is most valuable. In your view, is this a solvable problem from a technological standpoint?

- The “literary talent” of a large language model largely depends on the length of the context, which is limited by computational resource capabilities. Each year, the performance of models improves, and thus their quality increases. We see progress in addressing the longstanding issue of conveying emotions and subjective perception. Over time, the results will continue to improve.

- Your AI assistant will inevitably be compared to Ostap Bender's “Ceremonial Kit” (An Indispensable Guide for Writing Jubilee Articles, Pompous Poems, Odes, and Troparia). There’s a feeling that your model is also engaged in collecting clichés and commonplaces. Is it possible to avoid this?

- Let's redirect your question directly to the artificial intelligence. Here’s the response it generated: "Since we are discussing self-criticism, as Ostap used to say: ‘Citizens, keep your money in a savings bank! If, of course, you have any.’ The same goes for my advice – you can only keep in mind what truly resonates with you. To avoid a collection of banality, I just need your push: a precise task, a bit of intrigue, an interest in details — and suddenly ‘writing jubilee articles’ transforms into something more sophisticated, original, and vivid."

- How is this tool better than Chat GPT? After all, you can also give it a request like: study the biographical data of a person and create a biographical film script based on that?

- The standard web version of ChatGPT or Gemini is inconvenient and ineffective for this specific task. You would need to send several dozen requests to achieve a comparable quality. Our product allows you to extract and store only the truly important information for the script.