While Hollywood’s unions and studios are engaged in an ongoing power struggle over AI’s future role in filmed entertainment, Asia‘s screen industries are rushing toward a full embrace of the technology.
For an indication of the region’s stance on AI’s rapidly evolving role in screen entertainment, look no further than the 2026 lineup at Hong Kong’s Filmart, Asia’s leading content market and media industry convention.
Not long ago, Filmart’s popular seminar series was populated by top studio executives from Hollywood and China, each side keen on the potential for doing business together in the traditional realm of theatrical film. But as geopolitics has cast a pall over collaboration between the world’s two largest film markets in recent years, such executives have mostly vacated the scene at Filmart. Instead, perhaps unsurprisingly, the event’s organizers have pivoted toward the technologies and formats purported to be the industry’s next sources of growth, if not demise: AI, vertical microdramas — and, well, more AI.
Across Filmart’s keynote and panel discussion lineup this year — which runs March 17-20 in tandem with the event’s content sales convention — there are no fewer than 28 talks devoted to artificial intelligence. Subjects covered include AI in screenwriting, AI optimization of production workflows, AI in animation, AI for pre-vis, AI product demos, presentations of AI-made movies and much else. Just one of the two dozen-plus talks devoted to AI touches on a cautionary topic, or a potential downside of unrestrained AI use in the entertainment sector: the copyright infringement risks of AI-generated content.
“AI is transforming film and entertainment content production and reshaping the future of storytelling,” says Candas Yeung, an associate director at the HKTDC, Filmart’s organizers. “Reports indicate that a significant majority of movies now utilise some form of this technology during production. For 2026, we are diving deep into this world. We want to promote AI adoption and foster collaboration between content creators and technology specialists.”
None of the U.S. studio majors will be presenting at Filmart this year other than Warner Bros. Discovery, but executives from tech players like Google, Alibaba and Midjourney will publicly discuss subjects like balancing cinematic craft with generative AI, while a long roster of China’s leading AI startups — Kling, Minimax, ShengShu AI, TapNow AI and more — have been given a place of prominence at the event.
“One of our key goals for Filmart this year is to demonstrate the transformative power of generative AI and its seamless integration into production workflows,” says Zeng Yushen, head of operations at Kling AI, which is hosting a dedicated AI workshop at Filmart’s new AI hub. “As Asia’s premier entertainment marketplace, Filmart offers an unparalleled platform to engage with the world’s leading studios and content creators. We would like to leverage this opportunity to meet potential partners in the industry and explore how technology and storytelling can converge to drive the next era of cinema.”
Launched by Chinese short-video giant Kuaishou in June 2024, Kling AI has quickly emerged as one of Asia’s highest-profile generative-video platforms, offering text-to-video and image-to-video tools aimed at everyone from casual creators to professional film, TV and advertising teams. Kuaishou says Kling had attracted more than 60 million creators worldwide by the end of 2025 and generated over 600 million videos, while outside estimates have pegged the platform at roughly 12 million monthly active users. Among its early showcase projects, Kling has highlighted work with Timeaxis Studio on the hit Chinese period drama Swords Into Plowshares, where the tool was used to build dynamic territorial maps and accelerate effects-heavy previs, including cutting a storm-sequence simulation timeline from two months to two weeks.
As in the Hollywood creative community, many in Asia’s film business are deeply anxious about their livelihoods and the changes AI will bring to the art form that has been their life’s work. Korean industry elder statesman Park Chan-wook’s latest critically acclaimed feature, No Other Choice (2025), culminates in a trenchant dystopian vision of the degrading and inhumane AI endgame for working people. But unlike in Hollywood, Asia’s screen industries operate without organized unions to negotiate on film workers’ behalf. As a result, market forces and AI boosterism — rather than strategic safeguards negotiated through collective bargaining — are the factors most likely to shape how AI disrupts and embeds itself in the region’s film sector.
Adds the HKTDC’s Yeung: “This year’s focus on new formats and collaboration, including AI, short drama, and co-production, reflects where the industry is heading — attendees are encouraged to engage with these trends and explore how they can enhance their businesses and projects.”
