It's not about CGI. It's about practical effects; set and setting -- to convey the emotional feel of hope, safety, plenty and beauty.
Utopia requires verdant green lawns, large old trees, calm ponds or slowly flowing water. Big Open spaces. Lots of good light, clean surfaces, rich materials and blue skies.
This adds up to larger sets, more expensive sets (more care needed in their construction and use), lots of expensive lights or desirable locations -- everyone loves a picturesque park, so imagine how much it costs to shut one down for filming. And now imagine what happens if that day is cloudy, or rainy, or a scene just didn't get captured on schedule. (This is also why so very few movies are shot on or around water. And why, when they are, massive water tanks are so often used. Even though they are massively expensive to create, they're far cheaper than trying to film out on open water.)
If you need to build and furnish a "utopian" apartment or a building, it needs to be aesthetically pleasing, with graceful curves and clean surfaces. Drop the fancy chair? You might have to get a new one or at least spend time and effort reconditioning it or setting it so damage isn't visible on camera.
Dystopia, on the other hand, is conveyed with dark, cramped, dirty, broken and grimy sets and setting. These things are easy to find, are not in particularly high demand, can be done trivially on a sound-stage, etc. If you need a building you can literally just screw together shipping pallets and scrap metal. If you need to furnish a room, you take a stroll through a dump or buy some cheap dorm-class furniture and then beat it up a bit. And, importantly, less light. Fewer lights to rent and move and set up and operate (and move and set up and operate and move and set up and operate...). You can shoot into the night, you can shoot facing a decrepit building, you can shoot in the back of a rusted out buick in a garbage dump.
Utopia requires verdant green lawns, large old trees, calm ponds or slowly flowing water. Big Open spaces. Lots of good light, clean surfaces, rich materials and blue skies.
This adds up to larger sets, more expensive sets (more care needed in their construction and use), lots of expensive lights or desirable locations -- everyone loves a picturesque park, so imagine how much it costs to shut one down for filming. And now imagine what happens if that day is cloudy, or rainy, or a scene just didn't get captured on schedule. (This is also why so very few movies are shot on or around water. And why, when they are, massive water tanks are so often used. Even though they are massively expensive to create, they're far cheaper than trying to film out on open water.)
If you need to build and furnish a "utopian" apartment or a building, it needs to be aesthetically pleasing, with graceful curves and clean surfaces. Drop the fancy chair? You might have to get a new one or at least spend time and effort reconditioning it or setting it so damage isn't visible on camera.
Dystopia, on the other hand, is conveyed with dark, cramped, dirty, broken and grimy sets and setting. These things are easy to find, are not in particularly high demand, can be done trivially on a sound-stage, etc. If you need a building you can literally just screw together shipping pallets and scrap metal. If you need to furnish a room, you take a stroll through a dump or buy some cheap dorm-class furniture and then beat it up a bit. And, importantly, less light. Fewer lights to rent and move and set up and operate (and move and set up and operate and move and set up and operate...). You can shoot into the night, you can shoot facing a decrepit building, you can shoot in the back of a rusted out buick in a garbage dump.