Some time ago, Antonio Banderas had already committed himself to the ambitious project of a historical biographical film about the condottiero Hernán Cortés, a key figure in modern history, straddling the 15th and 16th centuries, famed for the subjugation of the Aztecs to the Kingdom of Spain. Although Paul Mignot had been named as the film’s director, with shooting already underway between Spain and France, Deadline has learned exclusively that he has been replaced by a notable return to the high-budget arena: we are talking about Alex Proyas, who is bringing to the feature his enthusiasm for Generative Artificial Intelligence.
Alex Proyas directs Antonio Banderas in Cortés, Generative AI slated for use
The last directorial effort of his was in 2016, the flop Gods of Egypt, and since then the creator of the cult The Crow and I, Robot has signed only short films, at least until a few months ago, when Alex Proyas announced that he had embraced the path of Artificial Intelligence: the only way, in his view, to stay true to his vision while keeping budgets manageable. It seems the mini‑epic Cortés with Antonio Banderas, set in 1519, will be the perfect occasion to test his ideas. Accepting to take over directing from Mignot, Proyas asserts: “Cortés is one of the great stories never told by cinema: a tale of ambition, conquest and betrayal, told through the eyes of the extraordinary woman Marina, an indigenous woman, who helped change the course of history. Nicholas Kazan wrote a script of notable breadth but also intimate, exploring the deep contradictions of man: visionary and unscrupulous, charismatic and monstrous, capable of extraordinary courage as well as unspeakable cruelty. With Antonio we have an actor who can embody every aspect of that complexity. My collaboration with Marco Weber and the Ex Machina team on Heaven has opened exciting new possibilities for cinematic storytelling: it allows us to bring this extraordinary world to life with a scope and visual ambition that once would have been unimaginable.”
The Heaven project to which Proyas refers is not yet released and is one of the two budding Ex Machina Studios projects, co-founded with Roger Avary and aimed at projects realized with Generative AI.
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