A Polish film uses AI to paste Putin's face on an actor

Playing a real-world political figure usually means hours in the makeup chair. Polish director Patryk Vega decided to skip the silicone prosthetics and let algorithms do the heavy lifting instead.

His upcoming English-language biopic, simply titled Putin, relies on AI visual effects to superimpose Vladimir Putin’s actual face onto an actor. The $15 million production is set to premiere on January 10 and will hit theaters across 64 countries.

Two years of mimicry meets visual tech

Vega didn't just render a digital puppet from scratch. Polish actor Sławomir Sobala spent two full years studying and mastering Putin's physical mannerisms, posture, and distinctive walk. The post-production team then used AI tools to paste the Russian president's real face over the actor's body.

As Vega told The Telegraph, conventional makeup simply wouldn't cut it for someone whose face is plastered across the news every single day. In his eyes, audiences wouldn't buy a traditional actor portraying a figure so universally recognized.

Vega originally planned to make a movie about Russian organized crime syndicates. After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, he shifted gears to profile what he called Russia’s biggest gangster.

The film weaves dramatized historical milestones with deeply satirical, fictional sequences spanning Putin's life from childhood to the ongoing war. While it shows his ruthless grab for power, Vega's stated goal was to expose him as a terrified coward. In one promotional image, the Russian leader is depicted wearing a diaper on the floor.

Vega even claimed that suspected Russian intelligence operatives once posed as American buyers and offered $200,000 for the script. Vega says he redirected them straight to Poland's intelligence agency, and the bidders vanished.

The ethics of deepfaking world leaders

The project has inevitably triggered sharp pushback. While tech observers are curious about a feature-length deepfake reaching commercial theaters, critics argue the film leans too hard on cheap shock value and crosses dangerous ethical boundaries.

Vega pushed back against the criticism in an interview with Gazeta Wyborcza, arguing that because Putin stands accused of war crimes, the broader social interest gives him a green light to tell the story this way.

Why it matters

For viewers, this isn't an educational documentary. It is an unapologetic, politically charged satire that tests whether you can tolerate an uncanny-valley deepfake across a two-hour theatrical runtime.

For the film industry, it marks a significant escalation. While Hollywood studios spend years negotiating digital likeness rights with union actors, an independent European filmmaker just bypassed traditional clearance altogether to deepfake a living world leader in a 64-country commercial release. The tools required to pull this off are no longer confined to big-budget studio labs.

We think the marketing maneuver is undeniably clever: a modest $15 million budget has commanded global headlines by marrying topical geopolitics with controversial technology. But the precedent looks precarious. Justifying non-consensual deepfakes under the banner of public interest creates a slippery slope where any public figure could find themselves starring in dramatized fictions they never agreed to make.