A studio just brought Val Kilmer back with AI. His family said yes.
"As Deep as the Grave" (FirstLine Films) released 7 minutes of AI-recreated footage of Kilmer, who died in 2025, built from family archive photos and pre-tracheotomy voice recordings, with the full blessing of his estate and daughter Mercedes, SAG guidelines followed, the estate compensated.
This isn't the unauthorized-deepfake story. It's the fully consented, by-the-book version. And it still couldn't get past how it made people feel, most real audience comments call it uncanny, "not there yet." One comment cut past the aesthetics entirely: "So now other actors will compete with dead stars for roles?"
That's really two questions. What does consent mean for an actor who's already gone and their family? And what does it mean for the actor still alive, still auditioning, now competing against a fully-consented AI version of a legend who never needs a per diem?
Comment: should there be a hard limit on this, and whose call should it be?
Source: FirstLine Films, "As Deep as the Grave" official YouTube channel.