Is CGI killing movies?

When asked if CGI is killing movies, most would simply state "No." In a way these people are correct. Since CGI has become common place, movies are doing better than ever. I still get my kicks out of the occasional hollywood summer blockbuster, but what is the cost of relying almost specifically on CGI special effects?

I am not a CGI hater by any means. If used correctly then CGI can do some amazing things that are simply impossible to do in real life. Remember the Liquid Metal Terminator (T-1000) from Terminator 2: Judgement Day? That is a perfect example of how to correctly use CGI special effects. It would have been impossible to create a believable liquid metal man without the use of CGI. Now the problem comes when a film relies too heavily on CGI and the story suffers. I am not going to bore you with another "Avatar is Dancing With Wolves" or "Transfomrers 2 Was Stupid" rant, becuase quite frankly we have all heard enought of that. I actually enjoyed Avatar and admit it is a visually stunning film. The CGI was amazing and I can't fault it just because it relies on CGI. Now does that mean Avatar deserves to be the highest grossing film of all time? Absolutely not, but it doesn't make it a bad movie. I admit even Transformers 2 has some redeaming qualities (at least on the visual level.)

My only fear is that movies are heading towards an age of visually stunning films that do nothing but show you pretty pictures. Hollywood knows what sells tickets and right now that is big explosive visually stunning CGI movies. CGI has it's place, but I can't help but feel I have been robbed of one of my favorite parts of cinema, the question of "Wow, how did they do that?"

One of my favorite films of all time was Ghostbusters. I believe this is due partially because of nostalgia and partially because of the amazing special effects.

I loved the ghosts they used in the movie, they had a truly other-worldly feel to them that I think would have been lost if this movie had been made in the age of CGI. It was fun as a kid to look at these Ghosts and wonder how they mad these otherworldly apparitions come to life? I would later learn about the art of puppetry, stop motion animation, and rubber suits put to scale models, but even then it was always fun to wonder which effect they used. There is a lot of talk about the third Ghosbusters film that may be in the works in the near future, and I will be horribly disappointed if they make it another CGI film.

On a more shameful note I also grew up loving the Ninja Turtles Movies. Looking back I have no idea why I loved these stupid movies, but I think a lot of it had to do with the time and effort they put into the Ninja Turtle Costumes. Regardless of how stupid the plot was or how laughably ridiculous the premise was, you can tell they put a lot of work into making these costumes look as realistic as a four mutant ninja turtle could look. In fact not too long ago they actually did make a Ninja Turtles movie using CGI.

Comparing the two, it's just not a competition in my book. Maybe I am just old fashioned and nostalgic but it just seems like a lot of movie magic has been lost in this new age of special effects. This fourth installment in the series is arguably the best in the series, but I could never agree because in my mind it will always need the amazing costumes to be a true ninja turtles film.

Probably the biggest CGI atrocity was when they added CGI effects to Star wars. I love the original films. As a special effects geek, I spent hours trying to figure out how they did everything in the original films. I can remember being horrified when they released some fancy new special edition a few years back "The Way It Was Meant To Be Seen!"

Take a look at the original Jabba the Hut on the left and the CGI Jabba they added on the special edition version on the Right. Tell me which one is the infamous space mobster and which one looks like a lazy attempt to mimic one. This new version was nothing but bigger explosions, changing the color of Luke's light-saber, and throwing way to much distracting things on the screen.

The Original Star wars films will forever be immortalized in film history, their prequels.... not so much. In these films the CGI just comes off as lazy sometimes and distracting most of the time. I cannot describe how bad some of the CGI creatures in Episode 2 looked compared to the puppets or suits worn in the original trilogy. The Rancor of episode 6 will always beat out the mentally retarded Jar Jar of Episode I.

Indiana Jones was not spared the infamous CGI sequal, as we saw in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. This film was bad on several levels, but one of the biggest flaws was that CGI took out all the magic that the original films had. I spent forever watching the boulder scene and the nazi face melting scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark trying to figure out how they did that. It turns out they used a wax dummy and melted it. Using time lapse film played at a super fast pace it appeared that the face was melting off... Now that's movie magic! Unfortunately now if they tried this it would probably just be a really stupid looking CGI image.

Let's face facts, CGI is just not organic. I hate when people make fun of old films for their special effects, because watching them I can see how much time and effort was put into them. I have always been a believer that CGI should be a last resort when making a film. You should only use it when it is impossible to do so otherwise. Hopefully hollywood will take notice of this before it is too late.

I feel like I could go on and on, but I will cut my rant short. I think Disney said it best himself when he said, "You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes real people to make the dream a reality."