{"title":"The future of the movie industry in the wake of generative AI: A perspective under EU and UK copyright law","authors":"Eleonora Rosati","doi":"10.1016/j.clsr.2025.106207","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Like all sectors, the movie industry has been both affected by and exploring potential uses of generative Artificial Intelligence ('<strong>AI</strong>'). On the one hand, movie studios have detected and begun to add warnings against unlicensed third-party uses of their content, including for AI training,<span><span><sup>1</sup></span></span> and have taken enforcement initiatives through court action. On the other hand, the use of AI within and by the industry itself has been growing. Regarding the latter, some have emphasised the opportunities presented by the implementation of AI, including by advancing claims that AI tools can offer a `purer' form of expression. Others have instead warned against the potential displacement of industry workers, including workers employed in technical roles and younger and emerging actors.</div><div>Against the background illustrated above, this study maps and critically evaluates relevant issues facing the development, deployment, and use of AI models from a movie industry perspective. The legal analysis is conducted having regard to EU and UK copyright law and is divided into three parts:<ul><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Input/AI training</strong>: By considering relevant legal restrictions applicable to the training of AI models on protected audiovisual content, the border between lawful unlicensed uses and restricted uses is drawn;</div></span></li><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Protectability of AI-generated outputs</strong>: Turning to the output generation phase, the protectability of such outputs is considered next, by focusing in particular on the requirements of authorship and originality under EU and UK copyright law;</div></span></li><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Legal risks and potential liability stemming from the use of third-party AI models for output generation</strong>: Still having regard to the output generation phase, relevant legal issues that might arise having regard to the use of AI models that `regurgitate' third-party training data at output generation are considered, alongside the question of style protection under copyright.</div></span></li></ul></div><div>The main conclusions are as follows:<ul><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Input/AI training</strong>: Insofar as model training on third-party protected content is concerned, there are no exceptions under EU/UK law that fully cover the entirety of these processes. As a result, lacking legislative reform, the establishment of a licensing framework appears unavoidable for such activities to be deemed lawful;</div></span></li><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Protectability of AI-generated outputs</strong>: The deployment of AI across various phases of the creative process does not render the resulting content unprotectable, provided that human involvement and control remain significant throughout, with the result that AI is relied upon as a tool that aids – rather than replaces – the creativity of industry workers.</div></span></li><li><span>•</span><span><div><strong>Legal risks and potential liability stemming from the use of third-party AI models for output generation</strong>: The use of AI models that generate infringing outputs, such as by regurgitating input data or merely imitating style, may trigger the application of exclusive rights under copyright and related rights. The resulting liability may vest with the user of such models, as well as the model developer/provider. The latter aspect means that terms that exclude any such liability may ultimately be found to be unenforceable against users and ineffective against rightholders.</div></span></li></ul></div></div>","PeriodicalId":51516,"journal":{"name":"Computer Law & Security Review","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article 106207"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2000,"publicationDate":"2025-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Computer Law & Security Review","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212473X25000793","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"LAW","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Like all sectors, the movie industry has been both affected by and exploring potential uses of generative Artificial Intelligence ('AI'). On the one hand, movie studios have detected and begun to add warnings against unlicensed third-party uses of their content, including for AI training,1 and have taken enforcement initiatives through court action. On the other hand, the use of AI within and by the industry itself has been growing. Regarding the latter, some have emphasised the opportunities presented by the implementation of AI, including by advancing claims that AI tools can offer a `purer' form of expression. Others have instead warned against the potential displacement of industry workers, including workers employed in technical roles and younger and emerging actors.
Against the background illustrated above, this study maps and critically evaluates relevant issues facing the development, deployment, and use of AI models from a movie industry perspective. The legal analysis is conducted having regard to EU and UK copyright law and is divided into three parts:
•
Input/AI training: By considering relevant legal restrictions applicable to the training of AI models on protected audiovisual content, the border between lawful unlicensed uses and restricted uses is drawn;
•
Protectability of AI-generated outputs: Turning to the output generation phase, the protectability of such outputs is considered next, by focusing in particular on the requirements of authorship and originality under EU and UK copyright law;
•
Legal risks and potential liability stemming from the use of third-party AI models for output generation: Still having regard to the output generation phase, relevant legal issues that might arise having regard to the use of AI models that `regurgitate' third-party training data at output generation are considered, alongside the question of style protection under copyright.
The main conclusions are as follows:
•
Input/AI training: Insofar as model training on third-party protected content is concerned, there are no exceptions under EU/UK law that fully cover the entirety of these processes. As a result, lacking legislative reform, the establishment of a licensing framework appears unavoidable for such activities to be deemed lawful;
•
Protectability of AI-generated outputs: The deployment of AI across various phases of the creative process does not render the resulting content unprotectable, provided that human involvement and control remain significant throughout, with the result that AI is relied upon as a tool that aids – rather than replaces – the creativity of industry workers.
•
Legal risks and potential liability stemming from the use of third-party AI models for output generation: The use of AI models that generate infringing outputs, such as by regurgitating input data or merely imitating style, may trigger the application of exclusive rights under copyright and related rights. The resulting liability may vest with the user of such models, as well as the model developer/provider. The latter aspect means that terms that exclude any such liability may ultimately be found to be unenforceable against users and ineffective against rightholders.
期刊介绍:
CLSR publishes refereed academic and practitioner papers on topics such as Web 2.0, IT security, Identity management, ID cards, RFID, interference with privacy, Internet law, telecoms regulation, online broadcasting, intellectual property, software law, e-commerce, outsourcing, data protection, EU policy, freedom of information, computer security and many other topics. In addition it provides a regular update on European Union developments, national news from more than 20 jurisdictions in both Europe and the Pacific Rim. It is looking for papers within the subject area that display good quality legal analysis and new lines of legal thought or policy development that go beyond mere description of the subject area, however accurate that may be.