I always associated the ballooning of budgets with the massive increase of CGI usage in films starting in the mid-2000's.
I was always under the impression that, in theory, CGI for the last decade was being used as a cost saving measure. After all, the old line about how CGI was making it possible to do things that were impossible x years ago seemed to die with the 1990's. I mean, once Cameron had his liquid metal robot, Spielberg had dinosaurs, and Lucas made a Star Wars film that wasn't corridors, quarries, forests and sand, and it was being used to have Tom Cruise jump down chimneys, and the like, the wow factor really seemed to dissipate.
Anyway, yes, in theory, having, say, a CGI representation of Spider-Man fighting Doctor Octopus on a clock tower saves time, and, by extension, money, because you don't have to take time to shoot the scene, and however long that will take (not the best example - I know there are live-action shots in the fight I refer to). The reality seems to be that CGI tends to get used as a hurried afterthought, quickly knocked out for the film to be ready on time, which, at best, yanks the budget up by millions, and, and worst, yanks the budget up, and looks rubbish.
Shut it, Love Actually! Do you want me to hole punch your face?
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