Zack Snyder's Visuals, Amazing or Trash?

[ManWithNoName18]

Zack Snyder has always been known for his distinct style, and visual effects. But his last three DC movies have been met with some polarizing reception.

Some call his movies the best looking cbm's out there.

However, some others would describe his recent work as desaturated, and unnecessarily dark. And find his recent CGI action scenes (like the Doomsday fight) to be plain bad.

What do you think?

 

[ManWithNoName18]

I'll say he has his moments. Overall like MOS, but BVS had a mix of some great parts and some not as great parts.

Stuff like the Warehouse fight scene, the part with Superman in Mexico, and the Indian ocean divers looked amazing.

But the Batmobile chase, and Doomsday fight IMO looked bad.

 

[OutOfBoose]

He has his moments, but if we don't count his motion comics movies (300, Watchmen), he's pretty inconsistent. Man of Steel is his most solid work visuals-wise. Batman v Superman looks mostly great, but his CGI destruction sequences look like they belong to a different movie. JL looks much worse.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Yes he has his moments but I was not impressed with the BvS big fight visuals. It looked bad.

 

[Mandon Knight]

Have loved his CBM films (bar 300, simply for the story itself, not the style or visuals), have loved the DECU to date and MoS for me and Watchmen are two of my fave CBM's of all time.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

They were trash in 300. They were trash in Watchmen. They were trash in Sucker Punch. They were trash in BvS.

Man of Steel was pretty good.

 

[Ivan Drago]

I think Snyder's visuals are an acquired taste.

I myself am not a fan and find his visuals to be very overrated. Probably because he isn't very good at anything else, so fans overhype his visual "prowess."

Minus the color saturation, Man of Steel is Snyder's best looking movie. He actually tried to film on real locations and do things practical when applicable. Though even MOS occasionally has the same "video-gamey" look as Snyder's other movies.

 

[Fincher]

I like what he was doing in Sucker Punch, Watchmen, and Man of Steel a lot. Batman v Superman I'm less enthusiastic about, and Justice League looks to be the same way.

I'm not sure which poll option to choose, because the first one's a little much, but the second one is d***ing with faint praise.

 

[Primal Slayer]

I loved everything about WW in BvS but lordt did this look like straight up green screen to me lol

 

[The Joker]

He has his moments. Some have been good, others have looked like video game cut scenes.

 

[Boy Scout]

I've rarely been impressed by him.

 

[Skrilla31]

I hate the way he approaches Superman action, it's all so weightless.

Actually if you take the word 'action' out that sentence would still apply.

 

[Rorschach2012]

This is NOT the aesthetic I imagined and dreamed of before we got a DC cinematic universe. I think the main thing I don't like is the lack of color

That said, I went with "he has his moments" because it's undeniably true. There are some beautiful shots in these movies

 

[2kt09]

Yeah, he's one of the best in the industry (even made shaky cam and frickin' lens flares look appealing). He does have his moments of wonky visuals.
Went with the first just because the second one does sound like faint praise.
Wish he did more animated features.

 

[The Fact]

He's awful, I've seen all his movies except Dawn of the Dead and the only one that looks remotely good is Watchmen and that's because the storyboards for that movie were perfected back in 1986. His action is lifeless and weightless and the thematic/symbolic content of his shots are at best the work of an amateur film student. I know this isn't exactly the thread topic but the continuity of his visuals aren't really helped by the poor editing of his movies.

Snyder is just all around awful.

 

[Mandon Knight]

He's awful, I've seen all his movies except Dawn of the Dead and the only one that looks remotely good is Watchmen and that's because the storyboards for that movie were perfected back in 1986. His action is lifeless and weightless and the thematic/symbolic content of his shots are at best the work of an amateur film student. I know this isn't exactly the thread topic but the continuity of his visuals aren't really helped by the poor editing of his movies.

Snyder is just all around awful.

We'll put you down as a maybe then shall we ?

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

I put he has his moments, as some parts of his movies do look poor. However, when he gets it right in terms of visuals he really gets it right. He has a good number of memorable epic shots in his movies IMO.

 

[jmc]

He has his moments, but the problem is he gets carried away with making everything look cool instead of allowing the audience to actually appreciate the action. He does these quick movements plus these ridiculous zooms which makes it difficult to see what's happening. This isn't a problem that's exclusive to him, the issue with a lot of modern action films is the over reliance on shaky camera work to convey action. Couple with bad and quick editing you're left with a shot that is essentially a blur. John Wick showed how you can do action without having the camera shake all the time, it's clean, crisps and beautiful because you can see the cheoreography.

 

[Zen Machine]

Neither. I've seen great stuff from him, and i've seen horrible stuff.

 

[FeedOnATreeFrog]

Both

 

[ernesth100]

Personally I think Snyder is still directing for the same reason Bay is still directing. They can sppeal to the simple side of peoples minds with flashy visuals and scenery.

 

[OutOfBoose]

I honestly don't know what shaky cam you're talking about, guys. Snyder doesn't use shaky cam. Shaky cam - Russos. Just check their brawls. But they use it smartly, because bright and clear picture compensates for that, as well as well-staged action sequences. Shaky cam in their case adds immersion and realism.

Snyder has a different problem. Work with CGI. His CGI destruction porn is often tiresome and ugly. But when he directs on-camera brawls set in real locations, IMO, they're really great. They're just sometimes spoiled by slow-motion, cool camera angles and extreme close-ups for coolness's sake. I really like the prison brawl in Watchmen, the dark alley brawl was great too. And Batman wrecking havoc in the warehouse fight was great too. None of these featured heavy CGI.

His best CGI work is the Smallville fight. It was shot on location and used as many real props as possible.

 

[Greens]

He has his moments. Some of the stuff he does is really good, some of it is pretty bad.

 

[jmc]

Personally I think Snyder is still directing for the same reason Bay is still directing. They can sppeal to the simple side of peoples minds with flashy visuals and scenery.

I thought for ages Snyder was a better director than Bay, because my reasoning was that at least he's trying to make something more than just a visual spectacle. But Bay totally owns his story telling weaknesses and embraces his loud obnoxious style. Snyder on the other hand seems to be almost completely unaware of his shortcomings. He's almost exactly like Bay in that deep down you can tell he really wants to do over the top action spectacles, but thinks he's making high art simply because the colour is muted and the acting is serious.

 

[FunkMiller]

We'll put you down as a maybe then shall we ?

Gold.

And Snyder is much like Lucas: too in love with imagery, not enough in love with story. They both crave gigantic digital set-pieces, while forgetting that movies - whatever the genre - need real, breathing human beings with a story to tell at the centre of everything for it to work.

Both of them can create wonderful, breath-taking visuals, and have no idea how to make anything with any true emotional and dramatic impact.