Best movie with little or no special effects.

[Frybird]

Primer was mentioned, but it is worth mentioning again for being an intelligent Sci-Fi Movie that has pretty much no special effects at all.

Other than that, i'm surprised.

When reading the opening post, i thought "What? There are many movies that don't use special effect and are great, whats the point"

But there are so many movies that use special effects but are not about them, Films that would work almost as good if they hadn't special effects, like Blindness, or Fight Club.

But actually coming up with a movie without much special effects is surprisingly hard.

Hmm...Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels didn't have much special effects and was very fun....

 

[Xaryn Mar]

I don't have the right name its a mid 80s or early 90s sci fi cop thriller by the name of 9 seconds or minutes, London is flooded and a monster is on the loose.

I can't recall the name for the life of me....

Sounds like a pretty Special Effect heavy film.

The only special effect was a guy in a suit and he had little screen time, this was before CGI and DVD took off, basically it had as much less special effects as the first 2 Freddy or Jason films.

He was chasing the monster that left a trail of bodies...he had a bad coffee habit and a green rookie that eventually took over from him once he died killing the monster.

I want to say 9 and a half seconds but that's not pulling the film up.

Split Second with Rutger Hauer.

 

[Frosk]

The Godfather
Goodfellas
Field of Dreams
Full Metal Jacket
The Shining

 

[Frybird]

Oh, just came up with one:

Gran Torino ist great and uses no special effects, except for a few gunshot and makeup effects

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

I don't have the right name its a mid 80s or early 90s sci fi cop thriller by the name of 9 seconds or minutes, London is flooded and a monster is on the loose.

I can't recall the name for the life of me....

Sounds like a pretty Special Effect heavy film.

The only special effect was a guy in a suit and he had little screen time, this was before CGI and DVD took off, basically it had as much less special effects as the first 2 Freddy or Jason films.

He was chasing the monster that left a trail of bodies...he had a bad coffee habit and a green rookie that eventually took over from him once he died killing the monster.

I want to say 9 and a half seconds but that's not pulling the film up.

Split Second with Rutger Hauer.

Yup thats it.

 

[Xerosch]

Blair Witch Project
House of Sand and Fog (one of the best movies you will ever see)
Nightwatch (the danish morgue movie, the other one wouldn't really fit in here...)

 

[konkwastaken]

jackass...they just get hurt for real, screw this makeup and cgi shit.

 

[The DSM]

Troll 2, no way are thoses special effects. On a more serious note shawshank redemption for OPs reason.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

To be honest, it's rare that any movie of merit is released that has no special effects. A gun firing with a blank is an effect, as is the squib explosion that lets the audience know the round found its mark. Of course, if our standard for special effect is "isn't CGI" then we open ourselves up a bit wider.

In that vein, I'd say that any of a number of Dramtic movies or Comedies qualify, as it's rare that such a movie relies much on special effects beyond the usual "movie magic". Clerks is probably my personal pick in this regard.

That said, there is merit in an effect when the audience cannot figure out where the reality ends and the special effect begins. Bad Boys 2 for example had an amazing chase sequence where cars are being thrown out the back of a speeding truck in an attempt to foil the pursuit. You KNOW that effects were done, but they were pulled off well enough that often what I thought was fancy stunt driving was in fact an elaborate effect.

CGI often breaks this illusion because outside of small doses in isolated moments it's easy to pick out. The minute the audience has a fair idea how you did something, you lose the magic of the moment and the special effect is just an effect. Really it would seem that because one doesn't rely on reality at all when creating a CGI effect, much of the realism is lost and all you have is a spectacle. Sure, one can create a fantastic looking CGI explosion, but what happened to simply building a scale model and blowing it up?

 

[latenightapplepie]

There are heaps! Hell, so many to the point where most of my favourite films have no special effects. Little Miss Sunshine, Garden State, Lost in Translation...I could go on. Special effects can make a film great, of course. Too often however, films containing special effects transform from conherently-plotted films to pretty, shallow lightshows.

 

[IronDuke]

EDIT: forget this post

 

[GodsOneMistake]

Monty Python

 

[Straitjacketeering]

Said plenty of times before and will be said again, Pulp Fiction.

 

[sorry user name taken.]

Wallace and gromit LOL


meh its a good kick back and relax movie...trips to the moon,wrong trousers ,window cleaners,werabbit,and then...the bakers one lol


>.>...yes I've seen them all llol

 

[sorry user name taken.]

Oh, just came up with one:

Gran Torino ist great and uses no special effects, except for a few gunshot and makeup effects

he looks old now...=[


but I'll still check it out =D

 

[synch987]

you guys are all idiots

12 angry men, possibly the best film ever made, has 13 characters in 1 room for an hour and a half

 

[SLy AsymMetrY]

The Shawshank Redemption is amazing. Made great by superb writing and acting alone. Great lines like: I had to go to prison to become a criminal".

 

[SmilingKitsune]

Wallace and gromit LOL


meh its a good kick back and relax movie...trips to the moon,wrong trousers ,window cleaners,werabbit,and then...the bakers one lol


>.>...yes I've seen them all llol

Wallace and Grommit ftw! Wrong trousers is one of my favourite childhood memories.

And to add to the topic, almost all older films have no special effects, Le Enfants Terrible and The 400 blows are two I saw recently, both amazing and devoild of any special effects.

 

[Vrex360]

The Black Balloon
Slumdog Millionaire
Mongol
The Boat that Rocked
Mary and Max
the Wackness
Elegy
Tenderness
Vicky Christina Barecelona
Pan's Labrynth
Paris 36
Little Children
Little Miss Sunshine
Gran Torino
Not quite Hollywood
Wolf Creek
Blair Witch Project
The Host
Babel
Jarhead
The Counterfitters
Bowling for Columbine

...and just about every other arthouse movie you care to name, the ones that play at the smaller independant theatres. That's where the good stuff is.