# Great Visual Movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 2, 2007, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601 "2007-02-02T20:34:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/81 "2007-04-23T19:40:20Z")
[QUOTE=freekalette] How about _Jurassic Park_? Even in today’s swirl of _LOTR_ and _Pirates_ and _300_, it still awes me when those brontosauri show up the first time. [/QUOTE] I agree with this – it’s still one of the best examples of CG, despite being one of the earliest. ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/82 "2007-04-23T19:50:16Z")
Personally I’d rank _Jurassic Park_ well ahead of _LOTR_ (and I can’t wait until my kids are old enough to see it!). _LOTR_ really bothered me; it seemed like, often, objects in the distance were just as focused and had the exact same color intensity as objects up close. Same with the more recent _Star Wars_, with row after row of soldiers all exactly the same, even though the furthest rows were farther away. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/83 "2007-04-23T20:03:20Z")
[QUOTE=Slithy Tove] That sound you may have heard just now was James Wong Howe, sighing in his grave. [/QUOTE] In general I’d agree; however, I’ve found that black & white cinematography tends to show off pixelation and contrast defects far worse than color, especially with dark images; the amount of color variation is to low, I guess, and you end up seeing distinct patches of dark. You’ll also never get the kind of contrast from a backlit screen as you will from projection. Watching the “emerging from the desert” scene in _Lawrence of Arabia_, for instance, never has the same impact on any television or monitor, regardless of size, as it does on even a modest cinema screen. (It should, of course, be viewed in full 70mm projection if at all possible.) Howe’s work is best seen in the cinema, where his Expressionalist-inspired paranoic camerawork in films like _The Manchurian Candidate_ and _Seconds_ are nothing short of breathtaking. [QUOTE=Chronos] For all of its flaws, _The Time Machine_ of a few years ago was visually very impressive. [/QUOTE] The biggest flaw was coincidentially naming it after an H.G. Wells story to which it has no relation whatsoever, other than the titular temporal displacement device and a few incidental character names. My vote, although it has already been mentioned, goes for _Blade Runner_. Many other films have had very impressive cinematography and special effects, but few have held up as well as this pre-CGI masterpiece of a claustrophobic, dystopian world in which vice, decrepitude, and mortality aren’t just atmosphere or themese but are tangible characters, more important than the actors themselves. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Mike\_Fun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9adbd/32.png) [@Mike\_Fun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mike_Fun)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/84 "2007-04-23T20:36:07Z")
I see “Koyaanisqatsi” is already mentioned, but don’t forget the other 2 in the trilogy: “Powaqqatsi” and “Naqoyqatsi.” There’s some very nice photography in all of them, but “Powaqqatsi” is the least depressing. ---
**Author:** ![Proudest\_Monkey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/proudest_monkey/32/13257_2.png) [@Proudest\_Monkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Proudest_Monkey)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/85 "2007-04-23T22:46:44Z")
[QUOTE=Trunk] I think _The Big Lebowski_ is a visually beautiful movie. The Coen Brothers seem to be one of the few modern directors who really think about shot composition in a way that a guy like Sergio Leone did. Great colors, and materials, and fades, and lights, and “deep” shots, and wide shots. One of the reasons that it’s great is that it’s a beatifully shot movie. [/QUOTE] One of the many things I love about _Fargo_ is the look of it. ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601/86 "2007-04-23T23:25:00Z")
We just rented and watched _A Good Year_. It was not a big earth-shattering great movie, but it was directed by Ridley Scott and it was filmed in Provence. It’s gorgeous to look at, and IMDB says that the locations were the Chateau La Canorgue and the village of Bonnieux. Francophiles would enjoy this bit of eye candy. And I always like Russell Crowe and Albert Finney, so they helped matters along, too. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-visual-movies/390601.md?page=4)