“Deepfakes” — the name for doctored videos that don’t appear doctored, and will almost certainly make misinformation even more of a problem than it is already — are an evil that will probably never get stuffed back inside Pandora’s Box. So when we share the latest jokey video, entitled “Home Stallone” and pretty much what you expect, please understand that we also find this more disturbing than we do amusing, even if it is semi-amusing.
So here’s what we get with the technology that will pretty much definitely be used by those in power looking to delude the masses: A seven-minute cut of Home Alone, the 1990 holiday classic about a boy stranded at home by his criminally incompetent parents, who defends the homestead from invading thieves in ways that, in real life, would lead to their deaths. But instead of young Macaulay Culkin’s angelic face we get Sylvester Stallone, voiced by one Joe Gaudet.
What is the joke, beyond the fact that Stallone rhymes with the movie’s title? Frankly, that’s it. But it does ruin a holiday classic currently available on Disney+. And even though it’s labeled as a deepfake, it may ruin any last vestiges of trust you may have had in moving images’ ability to tell any semblance of the truth. Anyway, with this and Kevin Spacey’s latest Frank Underwood cosplay video, your holidays are officially ruined.