What older movies made a good use of either side stepping special effects or have effects that somehow still hold up today? Why are they good movies?
The original Jurassic Park. Crazy to think that movie came out in 1993, over 32 years ago.
Lord of the Rings effects still hold up, in my opinion at least. The Balrog uses a lot of “hidden” information with the use of blackness to cover up bad cgi. Horse charges are zoomed out far enough to disguise how few horses are actually there. Most of the movies use practical effects though.
Especially when you compare the effects in Lord of the Rings to the Hobbit. You can really see when the studio is overworked and underpaid, even when it’s a studio as good as weta.
I can usually turn a blind eye to bad CGI, but The Hobbit was next-level awful. It wasn’t so much bad as unfinished. I felt I was watching a pirated movie before post production was complete.
Check out the M4 fan edit. I recommend this at every opportunity haha. They cut down the entire extended trilogy into a 4 hour film, covering only the events in The Hobbit novel. One of the many adjustments they make is colour correction, which really helps with the “unfinished” feel you’re talking about. It’s incredibly well done, and aside from a few janky cuts is the definitive version of The Hobbit movies imo.
Yeah, I was racking my brain to find a major movie filmed in the last decade without digital effects so that I could induce a recognition of the passage of time, and I couldn’t manage it. Covid started more than half a decade ago, and modern movies rarely use solely practical effects
Fury Road was almost all practical effects
So was sicario edit: and the raid, but most isn’t all. Visual effects are simply too tantalizing and/or useful. Particularly for landscapes, I simply don’t notice
Blade Runner (1982) still looks incredible. The miniatures and attention to detail in design effectively set the tone for subsequent cyberpunk.
Star wars, with models and miniatures.
Most great old movies, where cheesy effects were irrelevant next to the story.
Gravity Falls Little Gift Shop of Horrors, where the characters watch an ‘incredibly expensive’ stop motion scene that we (the audience) only see as reflected shadows.
Just gave the special editions a rewatch. The cgi inserted scenes have aged incredibly poorly, especially compared to the rest of the 1977 effects
The “Despecialized” editions are the best right now. I appreciate what Lucas wanted to do in the 90s but I wish he’d just left the originals alone.
I’ve really enjoyed 4K77.
And matte paintings. Never forget the legendary artists who turned paintings into scenery, or the camera workers who managed to blend in the actors to them.
- That first legendary pan-down to Tattooine, which the Tantive IV and Star Destroyer then fly past? Matte painting.
- The sterile hangars and seemingly-bottomless pits of the Death Star? Matte painting.
- The busy Rebel hangar on Yavin IV? Also a matte painting. I seem to remember reading that some of the hangar floor markings - besides making it look like an actual hangar - served to help align the matte with the set shots and coordinate extras so they wouldn’t accidentally walk out of the filmed segment and behind a matte portion.
How about most of the storm troopers standing at attention for the arrival of Vader? Matte painting.
The bottomless chasm in Bespin, matte painting.
Leia’s hair in the first one? Matte painting.
Don’t make me bust out the LART.
Jaws.
The shark prop didn’t work well and looked terrible, which resulted in much of it being left out of the movie. The movie is more terrifying because of this.
The shark has a name, it’s Bruce
The severed head rolling into view in the hole of the sunken boat still freaks me out. I think it was filmed in the back yard pool of one of the producers.
The fifth element.
Jurassic Park
Gremlins. My brother and I were just discussing this because we heard that the new Gremlins movie will be using analog effects.
deleted by creator
We live in the timeline that all the other timelines use as a ridiculous example.
You’re telling me there’s a dimension for EVERY possibility?
Yup.
So there’s a timeline where Donald Trump becomes president?
Twice!
One of my favorite songs lol. And I wanna be at the rnc by the same gury, Nick lutsgo
That was a beautiful song, but what the fuck is a grimlin?
It’s grEmlin!
You want old movies? How about Royal Wedding (1951). It has a scene where Fred Astaire dances on the walls and ceiling. There’s no cgi or special effects, it was just done with a simple camera trick.
Royal Wedding (1951)
Here’s the scene. When he sets the picture on the desk, they cut to a wide shot before the room starts spinning. Everything he touched had to be “nailed down”, including the cigarette, the hat and coats, the chair and the picture.
Tron. Vector graphics and filters gave a better effect than any of the weak sequels.
Forever underappreciated. They were hiring research professors at universities to do that stuff. It was so cutting edge that it was actually experimental.
And they got disqualified from the Oscars “because they cheated” – the following year there was a brand new nomination category for computer generated effects…
Just like the monkeys in 2001. They were so good, the Oscar jury thought they were animals instead of actors.
Yeah that part made me very sad.
Matrix 1. Other than some CGI, it doesn’t have so much special effects as much as it has special camera tricks.
I was kind of shocked how well Flight of the Navigator held up when I rewatched it for the first time as an adult a couple of years ago. The effects used for the ship were great.
It was a favourite growing up (up there’s with Explorers, The Goonies to me back then), I hadn’t watched it in decades till a few years ago. I also thought it held up really well. Besides the exterior spaceship there’s minimal effects anyways (plus cute aliens of course which were practical) it’s more an odd buddy (new friend?) comedy. I still thought what was there was for the ship effects held up better than expected for the time.
Course may be rose tinted glasses and all, but I really enjoyed it last time still, plus time travel is always awesome.
I can’t believe no one has said The Thing yet.
The creature effects are so good, it holds up today.
That head that turns into the spider walker, perhaps best special effect ever in my book.
Jurassic Park comes to mind. The scene with the raptors in the kitchen uses a mix of puppets and CGI.
I can’t believe I haven’t seen a mention for The Thief of Bagdad.
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0033152/
When you watch it you won’t believe it was made 85 years ago.
Roger Ebert reviewed it stunningly. https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-thief-of-bagdad-1940
