I recently saw judgment day Terminator II and guess what.. apart from the mercury man's mercury effect all others where actual stunts .. the bike off the ramp, chopper scene in the end and all the road side chases.

If the same movie was released at this time I believe it would still have been a hit with its 20yrs old graphics.

and thinking of high graphics the movie that comes to my mind is Jurasic park which at that time was a big leap in movie graphics.I wont say the story line was bad but it because popular just because of its graphics.

I guess a mix of both would be nice but i guess a good Director can always make the audience to imagine there own graphics :) by feeding an inspiring story line.