YouTube is Inundated With Fake Movie Trailers

Fake movie trailers created using a mix of AI-generated material and shots from other movies are all over YouTube… and the studios aren’t doing much to stop their spread. Sometimes, they even profit from them.

The Big Picture: A great movie trailer that goes viral is one of the most impactful drivers of ticket sales. If the buzz for a real trailer of a title gets watered down by AI dupes, it could generate the wrong kind of buzz and ultimately hurt the movie’s performance.

Behind the AI Slop: Fake movie trailers have come a long, weird way since the release of VJ4rawr2’s Titanic 2: Jack’s Back racked up 53 million views on YouTube in 2005.

• Bootstrapped production houses like KH Studio and Screen Culture are churning out several versions of fake trailers — either showing trailers that could be passed off as the real thing or ones showing actors who aren’t even cast.
• The firms use tools like Midjourney, ElevenLabs, and Leonardo AI to mass-produce the videos, according to Deadline.
• The fake trailers sometimes come out before the actual ones are released, or they’re billed as “new” right after an official trailer drops.
• The dupes rack up millions of views, get recommended in YouTube’s algorithm (which gives it more eyeballs and press), and generate millions in ad revenue. 
• With the advent of AI, fake trailer production is hitting overdrive, doubling Screen Culture’s views and subscribers over the past two years.

Closing Credits: While filmmakers hate these fake trailers, movie studios have been a bit more… opportunistic about them. Instead of requesting their takedown, Warner Bros. Discovery, Sony, and Paramount have all claimed monetization on the fake trailers, so the revenue can be funneled to them. Until there’s a major uproar by the creative community and their unions, the quiet profiting may continue… especially if it seems like a net positive toward raising awareness about the movies.

However, following Deadline’s investigation, YouTube disabled ad revenue on videos from Screen Culture and KH Studio over the weekend. So, some progress is being made for the greater movie good.