LOL the effects shots in Fulci films are so unconvincing, but i LOVE them, and I think there's something to that sentiment. At the end of the day a film makes an emotional impact and resonates for virtually every other reason than that we completely believe in the reality of its visual tricks.
My outlook on visual effects is this: modern eyes are very jaded to both practical and digital vfx, and most people will rarely be fooled by either one. I can always pick out cgi. On the other hand, I can usually identify where practical effects techniques were used. On rare occasion I find a practical effect can be indistinguishable from reality. So if we're going to have some awareness that what we're seeing is movie magic either way, would you rather the image in question A) looked like a video game, or B) was real photography of a physical thing that may look slightly off from reality? I think there's a place for both, but the choice should be aesthetically driven, and usually today it's not.
At the same time, the level of what practical effects shops are able to achieve today is incredible far beyond what we remember from the heyday of practical. Just take a look at some of the behind the scenes footage of ADI's scrapped work on the remake of The Thing for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBzpT7VmSaU Dude! Tell me this is not so much cooler, more fun, inspiring, sensual and feelsy than the cgi shit they ended up with! Today, the practical houses, given the appropriate budget, could solve most visual effects problems on a superior level of artistry. Unfortunately, for reasons of efficiency, financial practicality and producerial malleability, cgi is the go-to choice, and they rarely get an opportunity to shine. And to make things worse, studios currently tend to shoot for the roughest, bullshittiest cg work they can possibly get away with.
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[deleted]
5 years ago
Perhaps they couldn't afford a practical spider on a $70m budget? And as I said, the miniseries used practical effects, and they sucked. People LAUGH at that monstrosity when they see it. I'm sure others still are confused, like, "it's been the clown for over two hours, where did this crap come from all of a sudden?"
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zephyr_cape (2979)
5 years ago
That could be, but the budget for the effect is all down to where you're willing to go aesthetically. It's true that it would be costly to do something like full scale animatronics on the highest level, especially if we're keeping the direction of the scene mostly as is. There are so many ways you could tackle it though, and it's fascinating to imagine how else it could work.
I laugh at the spider in the miniseries too. How could anyone not? It's just ridiculous. I think the issue though isn't the medium but how it's used, and how the sequence was directed most of all. It sure as fuck doesn't make an imposing impression that we first see the creature in an extreme long shot, and it's this full Harryhausen mode, very un-scary/goofy crab/spider thing just slowly ambling around like whatever, and not amazingly well composited into the background. And then when we cut to close-ups it looks like it has the animation facility of a Chuck-E-Cheese performance, and its design is not much less comical. And then the losers throw it on its back like it's nothing and it clearly puts up no struggle at all. On and on, it's just a comically un-epic sequence in every way, and virtually the opposite of what it needed to be in all aspects.
In my opinion that whole final showdown episode in It's lair needs to be executed in a highly metaphysical, abstract, surreal way. It's a mistake to portray it as cohering much at all to mundane physical / temporal boundaries, and that would have to be a concerted effort of sensitive directing, editing, and visual effects, in which a variety of practical techniques could be used to powerful effect and stay well within those budgetary constraints.
Give me $0.5m and I could give you absolutely fucked up vfx sequences for a final showdown with It, done all practically.
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