Stuart Ford’s AGC Studios will open world sales before the Cannes market on Critterz, an AI generated animated family film. Described as “human-led but AI-assisted,” it is being positioned as among the first mainstream commercial family films. It will incorporate AI across all of its production pipeline.
The feature is an all length adaptation of a 2023 viral short of the same name, which was among the first films to use OpenAI’s creative tools. Chad Nelson, a creative strategist at OpenAI, initially drew the film’s characters with OpenAI’s DALL-E image generator. This happened before the project expanded into a full feature.
Screenwriters James Lamont and Jon Foster have joined the project. Their credits include Paddington in Peru and The Amazing World of Gumball. They join Tom Butterworth, the writer behind Ashes to Ashes. Nik Kleverov, co-founder of AI outfit Native Foreign, is directing and producing. Nelson, Kleverov, and Allan Niblo and James Richardson of London-based Vertigo Films round out the producing team.
What’s it about?
The film follows an anxious but brave woodland creature who unites with a group of eccentric outcasts, each carrying their own quirks and hidden strengths. Pascal Breton, Lionel Uzan, Jane Moore, Ford, and Aghi Koh serve as executive producers.
Unlike traditional animated features which are usually in production for three years and cost over $100 million. Critterz is in development in nine months costing under $30 million. The amount of money saved is directly correlated to the amount of AI tools used in production.
Although the voice cast is expected to be human, it has not yet been announced. It is understood that the budget is somewhere in the $30 million range, an amount that would have been much higher using traditional filmmaking.
AGC International has picked up international sales rights and will be screening first-look footage of Critterz to buyers at Cannes. In a statement, Kleverov said the film aimed to carry “the wonder of the ’80s fantasy movies I grew up on,” citing The Goonies and The NeverEnding Story as touchstones.
Vertigo’s Richardson added: “We’re delighted to be partnering with AGC to show the world how great artists and storytellers can utilize this incredible technology to do the only thing that really matters — make a great movie.”
When production was announced in September 2025, the Los Angeles Times asked whether Critterz heralded “AI’s Toy Story moment.” Writers’ and actors’ unions have raised concerns about job losses as AI tools increasingly enter scriptwriting and animation, making Critterz one of the more closely watched and debated projects heading into Cannes this year.
