CineDirector: Executable Shot Programs for Video Generation with Understanding in the Loop

A cinematic sequence must preserve a director's intent across deliberate visual discontinuities: each shot has a place in time, a camera path, and a cast that persists when the viewpoint changes. We introduce CineDirector, a framework that connects these requirements through an executable shot program. The program schedules transitions and binds camera, identity, and narrative conditions to individual shots, while a layered verifier checks generated footage against the same contract and revises failed shots locally. Director Distillation then learns from accepted revisions, carrying feedback into subsequent generation without an external verification loop. On 240 held-out programs, CineDirector records 0.04 latent frames of detected cut deviation, 1.62 degrees of camera rotation error, and 0.716 cross-shot identity similarity. Local revision reduces physical violations by 62% at 1.27 times the generator evaluations, and distillation retains a 45% reduction with external verification disabled. These results support a unified approach to controlling when a shot changes, what survives the change, and how execution improves through feedback.