Concept Exploration: EXTINCTION

Telling the Oldest Story with the Newest Tools: How AI, anthropology, and firelight shaped a cinematic vision of prehistory.

Extinction Concept Trailer

Growing up in France, I don’t think any single film had more impact on me than Jean-Jacques Annaud’s 1981 masterpiece La Guerre du Feu  (Quest for Fire).

It dared to do something few films had attempted before: it imagined a world without modern language, without familiar logic, and without apology. It was raw, strange, and completely transportive — a cinematic time machine. Watching it, you didn’t just see prehistory; you felt it. No narration, no dialogue and, lucky for us 80's kids, little to no adult oversight. Just firelight and fear, bone, and mud.

That spirit of unfiltered immersion and primal minimalism sparked Extinction, an original concept I pitched at Promise. Set in the prehistoric world, it unfolds through the eyes of the last Neanderthal clans as they battle for survival against the emergence of a new, more terrifying predator. It’s storytelling at its most primal, reimagined through cutting-edge 21st-century AI tools.

Today, we can do amazing things the creators of Quest for Fire couldn’t. With the help of AI, it’s possible to rapidly prototype an entire ancient world with astonishing fidelity and atmosphere. I designed the plot, characters, and clan dynamics through creative iteration that once would’ve taken months. For example, Extinction unfolds without modern speech using a constructed protolanguage I developed and rooted in anthropological research. I then applied AI voice modeling and language tools to shape a distinct dialect for the film. 

I also visualized untamed Ice Age landscapes using generative imagery, not just as background, but as part of the story’s emotional fabric — the vastness, the danger, and the beauty all reflecting the inner lives of the characters. My goal was to create a world that feels both mythic and grounded, where every frame carries the weight of survival and the spark of imagination. 

To make the animals feel authentic, I began by prompting and refining imagery, then upscaling it to capture the fine details of fur and texture, so their animated movement felt alive and convincing on screen. 

When it came time to craft the score, I spent a lot of time finding a composition that I felt represented ancient times but with a modern tone.

The challenge of Extinction wasn’t just technical. It was conceptual. How do you tell a story without relying on the rhythms of modern thinking? What does grief sound like when your language has only a few dozen words? What does war look like when no one has ever seen a banner, or even has a word for enemy?

Making Extinction was like learning to think with stone tools, a kind of storytelling time travel. With the Promise development team, I was able to shape it into something cinematic, grounded, and deeply human.

For me, the project was a reminder of something essential: storytelling is at the core of humanity. AI can accelerate progress and open new possibilities, but it can’t replace human expression, creative depth, or the nuances of emotion.

The fire may be different, and the tools more advanced, but it is the stories that keep us warm.

— Guillaume Hurbault, Gen AI Director at Promise