10 Recent Movies That Grossly Overestimated What Their CGI Could Do
3. I, Tonya
Last year's Oscar-winning Tonya Harding biopic naturally didn't require much in the way of elaborate VFX, and with its mere $11 million budget, rightly so.
The sparing CGI employed to assist Margot Robbie's transformation into the controversial figure skater, however, is none-too-convincing, and sticks out like a sore thumb in a mostly practical production.
Given the enormous complexity of the skating routines Harding performed, there's no way Robbie herself could replicate them for real, and the performance was so challenging the production even had trouble locating pro skaters who were able and available (several were busy training for the Olympics).
After shooting the scenes with a suitable skater, though, Robbie's face was pasted on top of the body double in post-production, the results of which are unfortunately incredibly unconvincing in the final film. The frequent use of slow-motion only makes it more abundantly clear that her face has been digitally composited, having a blurriness to it that just feels...off.
Director Craig Gillespie was obviously in a tough spot here, but he probably should've just stuck to wide shots rather than consistently drawing attention to his film's artifice in close-up.