International
Israel lures Hollywood filmmakers
MUMBAI: Crying halt to Hollywood filming Jesus‘ crucifixion in Italy and the Crusader invasion of the Holy Land in Morocco, Israel is wooing Hollywood filmmakers to shoot on its locations.
Israeli officials are promising better tax breaks, terror attack insurance and handouts of up to $400,000 in this connection. By this, they want to cash in on the multibillion-dollar industry and want the real Jerusalem on the silver screen and not Mediterranean stand-ins.
“It‘s absurd. Movies set in Jerusalem are filmed in Malta, Morocco and Greece,” Yoram Honig, an Israeli film director and 10th-Jeneration Jerusalemite has been quoted to have said.
He heads the Jerusalem Film Fund, which was set up three years ago to encourage more moviemaking in the city.
For a long time, it didn‘t make financial sense for the producers to shoot in Israel. According to Hollywood filmakers, Jerusalem is too volatile to ensure smooth filming on location.
While Israel in the 1980s attracted such star-studded productions as Sylvester Stallone‘s Rambo 3 and Chuck Norris‘ The Delta Force, it later lost out to other countries that started giving big tax incentives to producers.
International
Utopai Studios unveils 4K three-minute video generation for PAI platform
New Story Agent and editing tools aim to streamline AI-led filmmaking workflows
MUMBAI: Utopai Studios has announced a major upgrade to its PAI storytelling AI platform, introducing what it claims is an industry-first capability to generate three-minute videos in 4K resolution, alongside enhancements to its Story Agent feature.
The update, rolling out from April 15, expands the platform’s capabilities across the filmmaking process, from early concept development to post-production. The company said the new features are designed to help filmmakers maintain continuity across characters, scenes and visual styles, a key challenge in AI-driven storytelling.
At the heart of the release is a next-generation model that enables more structured narrative development, allowing creators to move more seamlessly from idea to execution. With tools such as multi-shot sequencing and multi-turn editing, the platform aims to give both studios and independent creators greater control over complex storytelling workflows.
Commenting on the launch, Utopai Studios co-founder and CTO Jie Yang said, “The next phase of AI in media will not be defined by isolated tools, but by systems that can carry story, continuity and collaboration across the full creative process.” He added that the update is a step towards enabling more practical, end-to-end narrative development at a professional level.
Echoing this, Utopai Studios co-founder and chief scientific officer Zijian He said, “Generative video is opening the door to a new production model, where creative ambition is less constrained by traditional cost and complexity.” He noted that the platform combines multimodal models with iterative editing to give creators more speed, control and consistency.
The company said PAI is already being used in professional film and television productions, particularly in Hollywood, for tasks such as pre-visualisation, scene design and post-production refinements. The latest update adds features including improved voice options, character consistency, unlimited editing and more flexible asset management.
Utopai also emphasised that its models are not trained on copyrighted material, positioning the platform as a cleaner alternative for creators and rights holders navigating the evolving AI landscape.
As AI continues to reshape content creation, Utopai’s latest push signals a shift from standalone tools to integrated systems, aiming to make high-quality filmmaking faster, more flexible and increasingly accessible.
