The Role of Special Effects in Body of Lies, a Movie by Ridley Scott

Special effects in movies, whether they be computer-generated images or sound design, can lead to a film‘s success or be its downfall. This is because effects are one of the primary tools used to influence an audience's suspension of disbelief. If done right, the belief will be suspended more; ifdone poorly, flaws will be more obvious to identify, to the point where the movie would be better if there were no effects at all. The 2008 terrorist action movie, Body of Lies, does a good job of balancing a particular amount of special effects.

There are only about two to three explosions in the entire film, with an added helicopter/car chase in the first act.

A scene of an explosion in Amsterdam was done with realistic explosives mixed with CGI shockwaves and debris. An example of poor special effects, particularly with CGI, would be from the 2017 blockbuster: Justice League. A well-known superhero icon, Superman, has only a few scenes of the film, yet people were able to spot an obvious flaw on actor Henry Cavill's face when CGI was used to remove his real-life mustache.

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This is probably because a good amount ofhis shots were closeups, but the audience's suspension of disbelief was immediately dropped when they could not give their attention to the plot and instead focused on Superman's distracting upper lip. Special effects are like any other tool when it comes to cinema: whether or not it works is not a simple question the result depends on how it‘s used.