‘Greatest slip backwards’: Gore Verbinski criticises Unreal Engine’s impact on film VFX realism

Gore Verbinski, director of ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’, has called the rise of Unreal Engine in film production “the greatest slip backwards”, arguing its use causes visual effects to resemble video game graphics rather than achieve cinematic realism.

The growing reliance on Unreal Engine, a 3D graphics tool originally designed for video game development, is rapidly reshaping the look and feel of modern visual effects in film and television. Gore Verbinski, acclaimed director of ‘The Ring’, ‘Rango’, and the first three ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ movies, voiced strong concerns over this trend in a recent interview with But Why Tho. His comments add a critical perspective to the ongoing debate about the aesthetic consequences of swapping traditional techniques and tools like Autodesk Maya for real-time engines favoured by game development.

Unreal Engine has been used in high-profile productions such as The Matrix Resurrections, The Mandalorian, and the Fallout series. However, Verbinski argues its strengths in game development don’t translate seamlessly to cinematic storytelling. When asked why visual effects seem less impressive than 15 years ago, he directly pointed to the integration of the Unreal Engine pipeline:

I think the simplest answer is you’ve seen the Unreal gaming engine enter the visual effects landscape. So it used to be a divide, with Unreal Engine being very good at video games, but then people started thinking maybe movies can also use Unreal for finished visual effects. So you have this sort of gaming aesthetic entering the world of cinema.

Unreal Engine aesthetic vs. traditional cinematic techniques

Verbinski credits older films, particularly those by Stanley Kubrick, for their enduring credibility, contrasting their practical effect methods (miniatures and painting) with today’s digital workflows. He states:

I think that’s why those Kubrick movies still hold up, because they were shooting miniatures and paintings, and now you’ve got this different aesthetic. It works with Marvel movies where you kind of know you’re in a heightened, unrealistic reality. I think it doesn’t work from a strictly photo-real standpoint.

A core technical issue, according to Verbinski, lies in the physics of light simulation and surface realism. He asserts:

I just don’t think it takes light the same way – I don’t think it fundamentally reacts to subsurface, scattering, and how light hits skin and reflects in the same way. So that’s how you get this uncanny valley when you come to creature animation, a lot of in-betweening is done for speed instead of being done by hand.

The “uncanny valley” describes the discomfort viewers experience when digital creatures or characters look almost, but not quite, human or real. Verbinski criticises the industry’s move towards automatised methods for the sake of speed, at the expense of manual artistry:

And then just what’s become acceptable from an executive standpoint, where they think no one will care that the ships in the ocean look like they’re not on the water. In the first Pirates movie, we were actually going out to sea and getting on a boat.

Cinematic motion and the limitations of game engines

Beyond photorealistic imagery, Verbinski draws a clear line between still visuals and believable animation. He argues that audience immersion hinges on more than static images; motion must respect real-world physics:

I think that Unreal Engine coming in and replacing Maya as a sort of fundamental is the greatest slip backwards.

He further elaborates on common mistakes in visual effects animation:

There’s also something, a mistake I think people make all the time on visual effects. You can make a very real helicopter. But as soon as it flies wrong, your brain knows it’s not real. It has to earn every turn; it has to move right. It’s still animation, sometimes it’s not just the lighting and the photography, sometimes it’s the motion.

Verbinski’s observations point to a growing gap between the push for real-time engines such as Unreal, favoured for budget and schedule efficiency, and the demands of truly convincing visual storytelling. He implies that prioritising speed and automation can come at a high creative and perceptual cost.

Key points from Gore Verbinski’s criticism:

• Unreal Engine originated in video game development and brings a “gaming aesthetic” into modern film visual effects.
• Films like The Matrix Resurrections, The Mandalorian, and the Fallout series used Unreal Engine extensively.
• Traditional techniques (miniatures, paintings) provide a more lasting, realistic aesthetic compared to digital pipelines dominated by Unreal.
• Verbinski claims Unreal’s light simulation and subsurface scattering are insufficient for photorealism, contributing to the ‘uncanny valley’ effect.
• Industry pressures for speed and reduced costs have led to the acceptance of less believable CG and animation.
• Realistic animation requires correct movement and behaviour, not just detailed models or textures.

As the industry continues to embrace Unreal Engine and similar technology for cost and time efficiencies, Verbinski’s critique serves as a warning: the quest for convenience might erode the tactile realism and emotional credibility that have anchored cinematic visual effects for decades.