Alvin Lee's AI Grief-Bot Debut 'Talk to Me When You Are Dead' Hits Busan

Singaporean director Alvin Lee brings "Talk to Me When You Are Dead," a black dramedy about a widower who turns AI grief-bots into a business, to the Asian Project Market at the Busan International Film Festival's Asian Contents & Film Market (ACFM). Anthony Chen and Gina Tan produce the debut feature, now in its third draft after several years in development.

The near-future story follows Yong Yi, a programmer who builds a digital replica of his late wife, Kate, to cope with her loss. A friend spots commercial potential and persuades him to launch a startup selling grief-bots to the newly bereaved. Yong Yi is then hired to secretly construct a replica of Mr. Yun, a celebrated terminally ill architect, recording the older man's memories under a hidden pretext. The two grow close, something like father and son, and as Mr. Yun weakens, Yong Yi must choose between a well-paid job and protecting a fragile man he has come to care about. That crisis forces him to face what really happened to Kate.

Where does the story come from?

Lee began the film while grieving his best friend, who died four years ago. While he was writing, a relative asked him to create an AI-generated video of someone the family had lost.

"I made it, and it gave real comfort to people I love, and I still do not know what to think about that," Lee says. "The person in it was not really him, but the comfort it created was real. That contradiction became the starting point of the film."

The project probes the line between real connection and digital preservation. Lee says he wants audiences to leave with a sense of hope and a reminder to hold on to their humanity as technology floods everyday life. "We can also live in comfort and denial, but many times the pain that breaks us is part of us, and vital to our growth. That is what makes us human," he says.

Why did Anthony Chen back a first-time director?

Chen, who has tracked Lee's short films since Lee was in film school, worked with him on shaping his first feature. "It has taken a few reiterations before we landed on this idea and I'm heartened that it comes from a personal place yet has wide universal appeal," Chen says.

Tan, who met Lee five years ago when she joined one of his shorts, praises the light touch he brings to difficult subjects. "He does not flinch from the hard things, but he never lets them become heavy-handed. That sensibility is precisely what 'Talk to Me When You Are Dead' demands, and precisely why he is the right person to make it," Tan says.

What does Busan offer the project?

Busan marks the project's first outing. The producers want the market to put Lee on the map as a first-time feature director, and they hope to find co-producers, financiers and other collaborators. They believe the story is universal enough to travel across regions.

Lee is already developing his next idea, which takes on present-day Singapore concerns — among them a low birth rate and a shortage of land — and adds a supernatural element. A market deal in Busan would move "Talk to Me When You Are Dead" from third draft toward production.