Filmmakers "abuse" the gift of CG

[hectorberlioz]

"Special effects" seem to take up a lot of space in movies. yes thanks to CG, filmmakers are able to to their movies faster and "better". meaning that no one filmaker seems to devote himself enough to his movie. its so easy to make bad action(it always was, but now...) movies, science fiction,fantasy(i'm not referring to any lotr movies)etc...There should be a movie category called "SPECIAL EFFECTS MOVIES" special effects are supposed to enhance a movie. not take up 90% of it. each summer there is a parade(and some are good) of special effects movies tromping out. HULK against WHATEVER ELSE, nobody cares anymore, "we know now that everything is possible in a movie with special effects, therefore we arent IMPRESSED." filmmakers have "abused" the gift of using special effects. no filmmaker is "creative" anymore. thats why the "starwars" movies are ruined. in the empire strikes back they used an eel for the giant space slug. in the attack of the clones there is a cartooney looking cat-like wierd thing that fights padme.

[IronParrot]

Wrong, wrong, completely wrong, and I've been over this a hundred times on a hundred messageboards and newspaper Letter-to-the-Editor pages.

I'm so sick of having to correct people on this notion that I'm not going to bother elaborating. I'll just boil it down to a few points:

1) Most of the stuff that's accused as being CG is actually not. Even critics as reputable as Roger Ebert have accused movies of being too CG-heavy only to use model-work and matte paintings as accidental examples.

2) CG does not require less time, skill or expenses as traditional physical FX work and pyrotechnics. It still requires considerable overhead, and the primary benefit of the technology is that it is easier to make changes as well as allow objects to act outside of material, mechanical constraints - thus, added realism. No more rubber textures where not intended.

3) CG is actually primarily used for compositing, and is superior to traditional optical printing and bluescreen techniques in that regard. That means no more Superman bluescreen halos. In principle, the idea of composition is still the same as it has always been, when matte paintings were still used (and they are still used).

4) Ever since Jaws in 1975, studios have always tried to make mindblowing FX-blockbusters. There already is a category for "special effects movies". Citizen Kane was a special effects movie. Yes, a lot of movies are technical showcases, and this has always been the norm. It's really a question of which technical showcases are influential enough in terms of their contribution to storytelling possibilities to go down as classics.

5) There's a huge difference between creativity of vision and creativity of logistics. While you have a point regarding the latter, CG has in fact expanded the former. You are also completely wrong in your assumption that in movies like the Star Wars prequels, it's all about CG. There's a tremendous amount of miniature model work in that movie. It's just so good that you can't tell the difference.

Sigh.

[Celebréiel]

Erp...coming to his defense...I dont think he was saying that *all* special fx are bad...or dont require alot of time (b/c they are totally impressive ) I think ,Imho, of which I totally understand , that the frustration was that it seems that big budget movies are heading more in the direction of spending time attracting people with spectacular, break-through movie tricks as opposed to attracting people with good story lines, plot twists and character development. I think thats the case too, more action , less story. Not saying that hasnt been the case for a while, and totally not saying the people doing the fx dont put in tons of work...its the studio's fault.
Its not that all fx are bad, every movie now uses some somewhere, but the giant seemingly silly fx where it would have been just as good without it...imho I would always rather see real emotion from real actors than something else (coughhulkcough)
Besides, its not correcting him, he wasnt wrong...he was just saying his opinion.

[IronParrot]

My point remains that CG is not to blame.

Yes, there are a lot of stupid FX movies. There have always been stupid FX movies. The reason you don't hear about them as much is because nobody cares about them anymore.

Also, as long as you believe the hype machines and actually go to stupid FX movies, the studios will get the message that "hey, consumers WANT this!" and make even more.

Thankfully, this summer was a good kick in the buttocks for most of them when they realized that releasing thirteen action sequels in the span of one season has very limited returns.

[Celebréiel]

Okay, yeah, I see what you mean now. Thats understandable....

Originally posted by IronParrot

Thankfully, this summer was a good kick in the buttocks for most of them when they realized that releasing thirteen action sequels in the span of one season has very limited returns.

There was 13 of em?! Man, I knew there was alot...but...sheesh...

[hectorberlioz]

Thank for coming to my defense. i never said special effects movies were bad. i just hate seeing the "competition" between studios...et cetera...celebreiel has already explained it...
i knew CITIZAN KANE was a special effects movie.
Dont worry Ironparrot, i cant hate you for thinking i was saying something else and correcting me..
i like reading your posts.

[jellyfishannah]

Yeah...the thing that frustrates me is people taking it and going all out with it. Maybe not CG...but FX in general. (especially in SW..ugh!) Lot's of special FX are awsome. Especially with someone as cool and original as PJ behind them... If you want to hear me ranting and raving about it just skip over to the SW forum...

[katya]

I don't like CG in animation. For example, in Zoids, like, all the times they show Zoids, they seem to be CG. (Not that I like Zoids that much...) Disney movies and things that are all computer are sort of weird. It doesn't look as good to me. It was cool-ish at first, but now it seems like every Disney movie is CG.

As for special effects movies, I guess I don't really care how they do it. I'm not so into the FX either way.

[Sween]

I dont think there is such a thing of abuse of CG! there is bad CG (such as attack of the clones- like watching a computer game) and very good CG (like LOTR)! PJ makes some good points about CG the point is you shouldnt know its there!

Films should allways be driven by plot but then again some films like LOTR just couldnt be made without CG!

Its like giving a person all the best stuff in the world to paint a picture with if they dont know how to draw a good picture its allways gonna be a crap painting

[johnnyrod]

Sween might be quite stupid but he's right.