Categories One-by-One: Visual Effects

[taki15]

Black Panther had plenty of artistic value. It was one of the few MCU films that was more than just a comic cash grab.

I disagree. The plot was nonsensical and it had perhaps the worst visual effects in the entire MCU.
I respect its cultural importance but personally I found it no better or worse than Ant-Man or Thor. Maybe we are something of an outlier here but the movie had a very lukewarm reception by both critics and fans.

Sorry, but the film is a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes (and a 78% audience score) and an 88 on Metacritic. I'm a high school teacher, and overwhelmingly my students would tell you it is one of their favorite films and the best Marvel film. You can not like the movie, but you can't say it had a lukewarm reception by critics or fans. It was a smash among both.

I'm talking about my country, and Europe in general. I remember how excited me and my friends were after reading all the raves from the American critics and dismissed our local ones who were far more reserved. And then we saw it and we were asking each other in befuddlement "Is this the same movie people are going nuts in the US?".

[Mister Tee]

Black Panther had plenty of artistic value. It was one of the few MCU films that was more than just a comic cash grab.

I disagree. The plot was nonsensical and it had perhaps the worst visual effects in the entire MCU.
I respect its cultural importance but personally I found it no better or worse than Ant-Man or Thor. Maybe we are something of an outlier here but the movie had a very lukewarm reception by both critics and fans.

Sorry, but the film is a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes (and a 78% audience score) and an 88 on Metacritic. I'm a high school teacher, and overwhelmingly my students would tell you it is one of their favorite films and the best Marvel film. You can not like the movie, but you can't say it had a lukewarm reception by critics or fans. It was a smash among both.

Co-sign. And I DON'T particularly like Black Panther -- I DO think it's wildly over-rated, on the basis of its cultural position. (Honestly,, I liked Doctor Strange more.) But I have to acknowledge this is a seriously minority position; that critics raved about it to the skies, and its stratospheric commercial success speaks to its immense popularity.

[FilmFan720]

Black Panther had plenty of artistic value. It was one of the few MCU films that was more than just a comic cash grab.

I disagree. The plot was nonsensical and it had perhaps the worst visual effects in the entire MCU.
I respect its cultural importance but personally I found it no better or worse than Ant-Man or Thor. Maybe we are something of an outlier here but the movie had a very lukewarm reception by both critics and fans.

Sorry, but the film is a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes (and a 78% audience score) and an 88 on Metacritic. I'm a high school teacher, and overwhelmingly my students would tell you it is one of their favorite films and the best Marvel film. You can not like the movie, but you can't say it had a lukewarm reception by critics or fans. It was a smash among both.

[taki15]

Black Panther had plenty of artistic value. It was one of the few MCU films that was more than just a comic cash grab.

I disagree. The plot was nonsensical and it had perhaps the worst visual effects in the entire MCU.
I respect its cultural importance but personally I found it no better or worse than Ant-Man or Thor. Maybe we are something of an outlier here but the movie had a very lukewarm reception by both critics and fans.

[Reza]

More than anything Black Panther was an enormous celebration of a rich "culture", of history and an ancient civilization. All the usual superhero tropes were built around that which made it very unique amongst the other comic book adventure films. For it's emphasis of that alone it showed great artistic value and was a major cut above the rest.

[OscarGuy]

Black Panther had plenty of artistic value. It was one of the few MCU films that was more than just a comic cash grab.

[taki15]

Enough people were sick of Disney's cash-in live action remakes that The Lion King fell to 1917 last year

I was fine with their voting for Not The Lion King. But why couldn’t it have been Avengers: Endgame? Thanos might be the best CG villain ever, and isn’t one Oscar a proper thank-you for the billions and billions that the franchise brought in?

Because the Academy loathes comic book movies. That is pretty clear not only from what people like Scorsese and Coppola are saying openly but also by all these anonymous Academy members babbling during the voting period (remember that guy who said that he will never vote for anything with the word Avengers in its title?).
And before anyone mentions "Black Panther", I think we all know that the reason this particular film was recognized had little to do with its artistic value.

[rolotomasi99]

Tenet doesn’t have much CGI (that I noticed) but it has a lot of old-fashioned, blow-shit-up visual effects and a great car chase. I wonder if the new, younger membership cares about that distinction.

I think the general Academy membership appreciates when they know a movie is filled with visual effects but they are not clear which are computer generated vs practical. TENET seems like one of the surest wins come Oscar night, with MIDNIGHT SKY the only possible spoiler.

[criddic3]

Love and Monsters might be a B-movie, but it is the one that I would vote for in this category.

I second that vote. It's a hugely entertaining "B-movie" and the effects are very well-done. The surprise nomination (few people were predicting it as a possibility) shows it has support from the VF/X branch and maybe if enough voters have seen it, it could upset here. "Tenet" was a decent movie and the effects were good but I think a lot of people were underwhelmed by it. Academy members may turn to other options this time. Then again, "Tenet" sounds like an easy choice on paper, so that may be how they check off the box.

[Sabin]

MaxWilder wrote
Tenet doesn’t have much CGI (that I noticed) but it has a lot of old-fashioned, blow-shit-up visual effects and a great car chase. I wonder if the new, younger membership cares about that distinction.

Perhaps. I just wonder which candidate do they gravitate towards?

[MaxWilder]

Tenet doesn’t have much CGI (that I noticed) but it has a lot of old-fashioned, blow-shit-up visual effects and a great car chase. I wonder if the new, younger membership cares about that distinction.

[Sabin]

Well, their list of newly invited Visual Effects artists as of 2020 are listed here. This doesn't answer the question but they're definitely bringing in more visual effects people.

https://www.awn.com/news/academy-invite ... ew-members

Over the last ten years, only twice has the eventual winner in this category not won an award from this group: Ex Machina and 1917. Ex Machina wasn't nominated for any awards. 1917 was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects but lost to The Irishman. Similarly, Tenet was only nominated for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature which seems to be The Main Award. Wikipedia defines it as: "While the award's title has changed several time within this period, the recipient has always been a visual effects-heavy feature film; film's with more background effects work have their own category, the Visual Effects Society Award for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Feature Motion Picture."

So, "Most Visual Effects."

Interestingly though, the winner of this award has won the Oscar for Best Visual Effects three times over the last ten years (Inception, Life of Pi, Gravity) and all early on in the decade. Only Interstellar and Blade Runner 2049 were nominated in this category as well. Do with that what you will. Hugo and First Man won Outstanding Supporting Effects, and 1917 was also nominated. But First Man is the only one to win a "side" award without being at least nominated for the "main award."

So, it seems as though the winners of the award tend to live in Outstanding Visual Effects or Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects. The winner for Outstanding Animated Character has seen winners like Life of Pi and The Jungle Book but they were also nominated and won the main award. This math doesn't really help us too much because Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects is filled with non nominees. Same thing with Outstanding Created Environment which has gone to Gravity, Interstellar, and Blade Runner 2049 but all of them were also up for the main award.

So, what does that mean? It means, it's not great to bet on a movie that isn't nominated by this group. So that would rule out Love and Monsters. It's not great to bet on a movie that's nominated for a side award but not the main award. So that rules out The One and Only Ivan and Mulan. But likewise, the winner of the main award has not produced a winner since Gravity.

I think Tenet is probably a safe enough bet but it's all hunch-work between it and The Midnight Sky. But I'd say this: yes, Christopher Nolan commands a lot of respect within the industry, but George Clooney possibly has more love.

[Mister Tee]

I truly don't remember if there's any correlation between this category and the winner at the Visual Effects Society -- but, as it happens, they opted for the consensus-sucky The Midnight Sky.

[gunnar]

I’ll never concede that The Midnight Sky is a real movie. (George Clooney directed and starred in a film and not one person has commented on it.)

Actually several of us have, I think we all agreed that it pretty much sucked.

It certainly did suck.

Love and Monsters might be a B-movie, but it is the one that I would vote for in this category. I wouldn't have a huge objection for The One and Only Ivan. The visual effects in Tenet didn't really impress me.

[Big Magilla]

I'm not ignoring this thread. I simply don't have an opinion as the only nominee I've seen is The Midnight Sky which I don't want to spend another minute thinking about.