Waiting for the technology

I've been thinking a lot about the phrase "waiting for the technology to catch up."  It's been used by a lot of filmmakers who want their projects to be heavy on special effects.  They usually announce the project and push the release back a bit so the hype can build up a bit and then finally release it.  Here's my question, has it really been worth the wait?  Are the final products better now than they would have been 10-15 years earlier when the idea first germinated?  The answer would be purely speculative of course, but I'm going to examine the issue using a few films as case studies.  Here we go.  

Star Wars

This franchise gives us the best example of a before-and-after that we're ever going to get.  The original trilogy was a trial of innovation for all involved.  Young George Lucas just had a script and the drive to get it done.  Everything else had to be made up on the fly, which drove up costs and caused terrible production delays.  And what was the final result?  A slot in the National Registry of films and a shiny reputation for a small visual effects company called Industrial Light & Magic, now a powerhouse corporation.  Lucas didn't wait for things to be ready, he got the right people behind him to make it all work, even though no one really knew how when they started.  

"Before the dark times, before the empire."

Fast forward thirty some years and we have the Prequel Trilogy, something so anticipated and so disappointing at the same time.  Now it's true that Lucas did not deliberately wait for new technology before producing the prequels, but the proliferation of CGI in the 1990s did contribute to his interest in creating more films.  In other words, part of his inspiration was the modern visual effects (as opposed to telling a good story).  

Now fingers have been pointed left and right as to why the prequels were so bad.  Some blame Lucas' control issues, his poor writing, the studio for not controlling him, etc.  One thing that cannot be overlooked is the overuse of greenscreen that inhibited the actors' performances and made the films look too clean and artificial, unlike the "used future" feel that made the originals stand out.  I'm not going to speculate on what the Prequels would have looked like if done differently, but I do know that using cutting edge CGI as an foundation was not the way to go.  

Ghostbusters

This film didn't do any waiting and, admittedly, the effects look a little dated now, but the film has endured because of a critical decision made in scripting.  Aykroyd's original script was much more special effects heavy and involved a more complex story involving time travel and other dimensions as the characters battled ghosts.  The mysticism and paranormal elements were much stronger, while still being a comedy intended for some SNL actors of the day.  Aykroyd showed  the script to director Ivan Reitman, who liked the idea but realized it would be prohibitively difficult to produce as written given the necessary budget and technology restrictions.  So, the script was heavily rewritten into a more down to Earth modern setting, with further adjustments as casting decisions were made.  

Had the original Ghostbusters script been shelved in the 1980s and appeared later down the line as a major effects project, it likely would have been a great loss to sci-fi's mainstream reputation.  Reitman had the right idea.  If something isn't feasible, change it until it is.  There are so many filmmakers, Lucas included, who cling so tightly to their original words without considering how much better they could be if changed to fit circumstance (I realize this is a double-edged sword so I'll return to my original point).  The people behind Ghostbusters chose not wait for new technology to do their film.  They did the most with what they had and, like the original Star Wars, the result was unencumbered success.    

Avatar

One should always be aware of counterarguments to one's thesis and this is a big one.  After all, it was a very trailblazing film in the field of special effects and it still holds the record for highest non-adjusted box office income.  So what do I have to say to that?  I just have one question.  Money aside, how well has it actually succeeded?  

James Cameron originally came up with idea for Avatar in the mid 90s.  The idea was to have synthetic, computer generated performers for most of the story.  A story which Cameron admits he pulled "from every science fiction book" he'd read as a kid (this will be important later).  As you may have guessed, he chose to wait ten or so years until the technology was ready.  His cue to proceed was the release of The Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean films, both of which featured several computer generated characters.  He took all the techniques used in those films and increased them ten fold to create the overly majestic Na'vi and vibrant Pandora.  The efforts were certainly not wasted.  

I don't consider this film a failure by any measure, but I also don't feel it deserves its title as record holder.  If you read a few reviews of the film, you'll see two common points.  See if you can catch them.  

"Avatar is definitely not into breaking new narrative ground, but its ability to balance a familiar story with groundbreaking visuals is potent enough that even at an overly long 2 hours and 40 minutes this is a film people will be seeing more than once."  

-Kenneth Turan Los Angeles Times

"Cameron knows how to harness technology to storytelling. He's been cooking up the plot of Avatar since childhood... The Na'vi are... similar... to the indigenous people that America has historically exploited. If you're not thinking Native Americans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, Cameron nudges you with allusions to Dances With Wolves and the genocidal heat behind such terms as "fight terror with terror" and "shock and awe." Dialogue is not Cameron's strong suit."

-Peter Travers Rolling Stone

"Avatar is not simply a sensational entertainment, although it is that. It's a technical breakthrough. It has a flat-out Green and anti-war message."

-Roger Ebert

 Do you see the pattern?  Everyone loves the visuals, but most aren't too crazy about the story or the black and white themes.  So the strongest thing this film has going for it is the special effects that Cameron waited a decade for.  The story could have been done as a low budget animated film with little difference whatsoever.  This is the deficiency that brings the film down for me.  

There is one final point and that is on the endurance of the film in popular culture.  Yes, it was a big success and a lot of people loved it, but how much presence does it really have?  In the years since Avatar came out, I've heard people quote The Dark Knight, Star Wars (including Episode I), Ghostbusters, Terminator, Star Trek, Pirates of the Caribbean, and others, but I've never heard anyone quote Avatar.  (And saying "I see you" while talking to your friend on a cell phone doesn't count).  Na'vi still appear in cosplay circles but in diminishing numbers as people return to more enduring characters.  The film is fading from public consciousness and its technological high ground isn't going to last forever.  If Cameron ever finishes any sequels, that will be another story, but on its own, I don't think it has the presence as other sci-fi classics.  

Conclusions

Having great special effects makes for awesome trailer material and it will fill theater seats, but it won't make a film great.  The lessons from Star Wars and Ghostbusters is that it's usually better to start sooner rather than later.  A filmmaker may find himself surprised by how the right people at the right time can create genuine movie magic.  If an awesome visual effect technology is the only thing holding a film back, a filmmaker should question how strong the film will be once its ready.  To paraphrase a quote from a little 90s film, if a film is not enough without it, it will most likely never be enough with it. 

"The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

 -Arthur C. Clarke
Hazards of Prophecy: The Failure of Imagination