Christopher Nolan, one of the most lauded directors in Hollywood, is warning that the AI boom is "terrifying" and advocates for human "accountability," as he commented on his latest movie Oppenheimer that's set to drop in theaters this week. 

"Applied to AI, that's a terrifying possibility. Terrifying," he said. "Not least because AI systems will go into defensive infrastructure ultimately. They'll be in charge of nuclear weapons."

Nolan gave this comment at a panel in New York when attending a special screening session of Oppenheimer. 

"When I talk to the leading researchers in the field of AI right now, for example, they literally refer to this – right now – as their Oppenheimer moment," Nolan told Meet the Press anchor Chuck Todd who was hosting the panel. 

"They're looking to history to say, 'What are the responsibilities for scientists developing new technologies that may have unintended consequences?'" 

Nolan's comment came amid the ongoing strikes in Hollywood surrounding the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the film industry.

The strikes, in which leaders of Hollywood's actors' union (SAG-AFTRA) have joined screenwriters for the first time in more than six decades, have shut down production across the entertainment industry since last week. Though originally intended for renegotiation on actors pay that's been undercut by inflation and the streaming ecosystems, the strikes also conjoins the threat of unregulated use of artificial intelligence.

The Writers Guild of America (WGA) has demanded the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) ban AI from being used to write and rewrite material.

Oppenheimer is a biographical drama that stars Cillian Murphy as the titular J. Robert Oppenheimer, who is known as "the father of the atomic bomb," and will be released in cinemas on July 21.