Remember the days when Bob De Niro went from Jake La Motta to Jake La Fatta and picked up an Oscar, or Vincent D’Onofrio packed on 70-something pounds so R. Lee Ermey could verbally abuse him, or Tom Hanks turned into a guy you’d easily recognize from Downtown L.A. for his role in Cast Away? Those days may be over as scientists in Germany have reportedly designed software that can convincingly alter an actor’s body type on screen. According to the video below, the software, called MovieReshape, takes sample body types from hundreds of individuals and can use a composite of those as a template to make Phillip Seymour Hoffman look like Matthew McConaughey or vice versa.
Okay, maybe not that drastic, but if it does what they say it can do, then the days of actors getting fat and lazy and then saying it’s for a role when its really them just being fat and lazy may be over. But then again, with this software, it may not matter. The implications are staggering. And the portents for more Bridget Jones movies are equally staggering