CGI or Computer Generated Imagery was first used in 1973’s Westworld. At the time of course, it wasn’t all that impressive but it definitely started the use of CGI in movies. You can basically create and do anything with the power of imagination and CGI; fly, explode, shoot lasers, lift things with your mind, anything.

But just because everything is CGI-ed, doesn’t make it a good movie nor does it necessarily make things look cool so for this list, I’m going to share you guys some scenes or special effects in movies that didn’t use any (or much) CGI.

Spider-Man (2002)

Let’s go back to the era of Toby Mcguire being the first live-action movie version of Spider-Man. Those were the days. Although some scenes in the movie did use CGI, there was 1 in particular that didn’t use CGI; the tray catching scene.

In the scene, Mary Jane slipped on a spilled drink in the cafeteria but Peter (thanks to his spider senses) managed to catch her and all the food that was on her tray. This scene took many, many attempts to film and was even considered to be cut due to how difficult it was but the cast and production team managed to film that scene in just 1 day instead of 2.

Jurassic Park (1993)

Jurassic Park was a groundbreaking movie itself. Definitely ahead of its time. Most if not all scenes with the dinosaurs were not CGI-ed. Instead, they use Animatronics to film this movie. What better way to make it more real than “real” dinosaurs right?

In this behind the scenes footage, you can see just how big the T-Rex is and how realistic it moves. That’s enough to scare anything. The kitchen scene with the Velociraptors, if you look closely at 1:43, you can see a film crew’s hand one of the raptors.

Inception (2010)

There’s no way this scene wasn’t CGI! Wrong! It really wasn’t. At least for the most part. All it took was practical effects, some explosives and specialised cameras to film this scene.

Which scene? The Paris cafe scene with everything exploding around Leonardo Dicaprio and Ellen Page. The behind the scenes video below shows exactly how they make this effect happen.

So there you have it. Which scene in a movie you thought was CGI but it actually wasn’t? Share them in the comments and maybe I’ll feature them in the next article.