Coming right before an emotional Sundance Film Festival that paid tribute to its departed leader, Robert Redford, and its move to a new host city, Utah quietly took a big leap into AI filmmaking.
A $2 million grant for a new company, Nuovo Film Festival, was approved during a Jan. 8 meeting of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development in Utah, per a recording of the meeting reviewed by Variety. The board’s approval recommendation is now in a standard detail-gathering phase before the grant award is finalized.
Nuovo is described as a “film ecosystem” that will include a filmmaking lab designed to use “technology and AI”; the creation of an AI soundstage that could allegedly help to create blockbuster films at a fraction of the cost; enhanced state incentive programs to bring filmmakers to Utah; and film craft education and certification in the state’s high schools and colleges.
The action takes place at a time when the entertainment industry is simultaneously bullish and anxious about how AI will impact its future. For example, a $250 million studio specializing in AI-driven media formats was recently announced to open in New Jersey. Yet Paramount and Disney have both sent cease-and-desist letters to TikTok owner and AI company ByteDance over intellectual property Infringement by AI platforms and services in the last few weeks, illustrating the industry’s ebb and flow with the fast-changing technology.
The Nuovo pitch was brought to the meeting by Scott Anderson, the president and CEO of Utah’s Zions Bank. He said that the board would be comprised of TV producer and former MGM Television chief Mark Burnett; advertising mogul Gordon Bowen, the founder of McGarryBowen and CCO of Dentsu Aegis Network; Geralyn Dreyfous, co-founder of documentary funding group Impact Partners; and Jim Swartz, the founder of Accel Venture Capital.
According to Anderson’s presentation, Nuovo Film Festival has five key “pillars”:
1) “Create and establish a filmmaking lab to be held in Utah to teach new filmmakers how to tell their story using technology and AI.”
2) “Enhance the state’s incentive programs to bring filmmakers to Utah, that would be more competitive with those incentives offered in Texas, Georgia, Louisiana, New Mexico and New York, and that would encourage them not only to come to Utah, but to set up operations in Utah, and that would also encourage local filmmakers to make their films in Utah.”
3) “Create an AI soundstage with its dedicated database and film and power source at Convergence Hall at the point where filmmakers could come and use this new technology. We are told that if this were built, it would be the first of its kind in the United States. And the advantage of this is that if you were to make an ‘Avengers’ film now, it would cost about $140 to $200 million to take three years to make. If you were to use an AI-enabled soundstage to do it, you could do it in nine months at a cost of $10 million. So it would democratize filmmaking and give the power back to the filmmakers rather than to the studios.”
4) “Engage Harbor Fund to move its operations to Utah. Harbor Fund is an international film funding organization that brings together filmmakers, venture capitalists, and philanthropists to decide which films to finance.”
5) “Establishing certificate programs at rural high schools, as well as tech colleges and our universities, in educating the filmmaking crafts like makeup, scenery, design, sound, stage, and editing, so that Utah would have the dedicated and trained workforce to allow filmmakers to come here and use the local workforce instead of bringing them here.”
Lance Soffe, director of targeted industries for the Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Development, introduced the grant and motion discussion at the meeting.
The official motion read that the board “recommends Nuovo Film Festival Incorporated, NFFI, for an industrial assistance account one-time grant of $2 million to operationalize key film ecosystem objectives through the establishment of specialized programming, workforce, and infrastructure.”
When presenting it, Soffee spoke about his perception of the Utah economy and its relation to the film industry.
“Utah is at an important crossroads in our creative economy,” he said. “With the Sundance Film Festival departing, the governor and state leadership worked to identify a meaningful solution that keeps Utah relevant in the film space. The reality is that the festival landscape nationwide is shifting. Traditional festivals are not generating the same impact they once did. Instead of trying to recreate an aging model, Nuovo has presented a forward-thinking approach that builds on Utah’s legacy while embracing where the industry is going. Their proposal positions Utah as the center of next-generation storytelling through AI-enabled filmmaking labs, the nation’s first AI-supported soundstage, partnerships with our universities and investment pipelines that bring filmmakers, financiers and technologists together. By supporting Nuovo through the IAA fund, we give Utah’s film ecosystem tools that no other state is offering, ensuring that we not only stay on the map, but lead in the emerging world of AI-driven film and content creation, with a concentration on supporting Utah’s local filmmaking ecosystem.”
No specifics about actual economic impact, job creation or loss, or tourism growth were discussed in the meeting. A source close to the discussions around the project says it was in development ever since the announcement that Sundance was moving to Boulder, and that the state’s governor, speaker of the house and board members had been privy to discussions about the project long before the vote took place.
Mariah Mellus, the executive director of the Utah Film Center, said she is “optimistic” about Nuovo and is set to meet with Anderson in the coming weeks to hear more about their plans.
“Any money spent helping to grow Utah’s film industry is a great thing,” she said. “I am eager to learn more about Nuovo.”
“Utah is focused on making investments that drive our creative economy, inspire the next generation of audiences and provide opportunities for creatives of all stripes,” the Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity shared in a statement. “The state is actively exploring opportunities to further cultivate the ecosystem of talent, infrastructure and incentives that have successfully attracted filmmakers and productions to our beautiful state.”
Anderson and the other board members did not respond to a request for comment.