Sir Christopher Nolan has praised young people for rejecting AI "slop".

The Odyssey filmmaker is hopeful for the future of cinema after seeing the likes of Obsession director Curry Barker and Backrooms' Kane Parsons reject artificial intelligence in favour of practical effects, and has seen first hand in his own four children that the younger generation are not impressed by all elements of the technology.

He told The Telegraph: "I've never seen a more rapid wholesale dismissal of a supposedly foundational jump in technology in my lifetime.

"So much energy has been expended on bringing in AI, but if you look at that generation's reaction, they're utterly rejecting it."

Of his own kids, he added: "Their judgment of AI slop has been immediate and harsh. They see it for what it is very quickly - and it's much easier for them to identify it, because it grew out of an online world they know really well.

"And while that doesn't mean that every aspect of the technology is useless or meaningless, in film-making it's hitting at exactly the wrong time.

"After years of driving towards heavily virtual environments, we're seeing a renewed interest in more tactile, more real forms of storytelling."

Christopher is excited about the future of film with the rise of a new generation of directors.

He said: "I think cinema is vital and essential and continues to transform itself - we've got all these great new young voices in movies, making the medium their own and moving it forward."

Fellow director Guillermo del Toro recently spoke of his fears that AI is leading the world on the verge of "cinema illiteracy".

Speaking at a BFI America event last month, he warned: "We are on the verge of image illiteracy. We are on the verge of cinema illiteracy.

"The pact between man and image is sacred, but we are in a time when that is in danger.

"We are told images can be generated by artificial means. The existence of an image is not just to be there. It is to connect us, to make us feel beauty."

And last year, the Shape of Water filmmaker insisted he would "rather die" than use the tech in his movies.

He told NPR: "AI, particularly generative AI - I am not interested, nor will I ever be interested. I'm 61, and I hope to be able to remain uninterested in using it at all until I croak.

"The other day, somebody wrote me an email, said, 'What is your stance on AI?' And my answer was very short. I said, 'I'd rather die.'"

But Steven Spielberg is "withholding judgment on AI".

He said on the IMO podcast earlier this year: "I'm kind of withholding judgment on AI until I see really how it is being used."

The Hollywood director observed that AI can be an effective tool "that can create and find solutions to medical issues" and in education.

However, the Ready Player One filmmaker is much more doubtful of AI's capabilities in the creative industries.

He explained: "Where I don't love AI is where it takes a position, or there's an empty chair at a writer's table, and there's six writers and an empty chair and there's a computer in front of the empty chair and it is the seventh writer.

"I'm not willing to substitute, you know, because I don't really believe in its sentience. I don't believe there is any substitute for the soul. I don't think that is an algorithm that's inventible, if there is such a word.

"I think a computer that thinks it feels more than we feel is anathema to the way I was raised and how I'll practice my own trade of producing and directing in the future."

Spielberg believes AI can perform some "legwork" for people like himself. However, he noted that AI shouldn't have "the final word on anything creative".

He said: "I don't want AI involved in that way.

"If AI wants to help me find locations, that's great. Saves us all a lot of legwork. But don't tell me that I don't have the right antagonist in this movie.

"Don't tell me how to write my dialogue for this character. Don't tell me where the camera has to go. And also don't tell me what the set should look like, unless AI is simply a tool in a large tool chest of the production designer and just one of many tools the production designer uses..."