This year's breakouts like 'Project Hail Mary' and 'Obsession' were made by filmmakers who sweated. While CG-stuffed franchise disappointments such as 'Supergirl,' 'Moana,' and 'The Mandalorian and Grogu' looked lazy.
Hail Mary had a ton of CGI too. You can’t tell because enough is real that the actor behaves like it is, the camera moves as if it is, and the artists know what real looks like.
A major reason the first Transformers looks and feels as good as it does, even so long after it came out, is that the director has an incredible ability to imagine where something will be after the CGI pass. He could shoot entire action scenes with the camera behaving as if it was reacting to what actors did, not an empty street.
Hail Mary had a ton of CGI too. You can’t tell because enough is real that the actor behaves like it is, the camera moves as if it is, and the artists know what real looks like.
A major reason the first Transformers looks and feels as good as it does, even so long after it came out, is that the director has an incredible ability to imagine where something will be after the CGI pass. He could shoot entire action scenes with the camera behaving as if it was reacting to what actors did, not an empty street.