Award Winning FX – The Oscars 2023

Who nabbed what, plus our dream line-up for 2024

Even the most serious UK-based film fans don’t do the graveyard shift to watch the Oscars live. We’re no different at mustard FX, with the caveat that we triple check it’ll be recording whilst we’re doing some serious snoozing. 

And the next morning, we’ll already have updated ourselves on who’s walked away with the big gongs (Best Picture, Best Actor, etc) before the kettle’s finished boiling. That’s all very nice to chat about with our neighbours, but what we’re really keen to find out is which pick of the flicks scooped the Best Visual Effects award, the one that often goes unnoticed by the average Joe.  

This March 12th it was awarded to James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water. This wasn’t exactly a shock, given Wētā FX’s game-changing work on the long-gestating sequel. 

Wētā’s Joe Letteri (Senior VFX Supervisor), Eric Saindon (FX Senior VFX Supervisor) and Daniel Barrett (FX Senior Animation Supervisor) picked up the statuette. Letteri (incidentally, now a five-time Oscar winner) praised the artistic and technological advancements achieved by his team, which enabled James Cameron to create his ambitious project onscreen. 

“Eric, Dan, and I are honoured to represent the 1,700 Wētā FX crew that contributed to Avatar: The Way Of Water,” he said. “This recognition is a testament to the artistry and creativity of our entire crew, and to our partnership with James Cameron, Jon Landau, and the entire Lightstorm team”. 

The Oscar sits in the middle of The Way Of Water’s already overcrowded display cabinet, which also saw the movie winning multiple awards elsewhere, including a BAFTA, a thoroughly impressive nine Visual Effects Society (VES) Awards, as well as two ANNIE Awards this season. It’s also the seventh time Wētā has won the Best Visual Effects gong at the Academy Awards, following triumphs for the still exceptional The Lord of the Rings trilogy, King Kong, The Jungle Book and the first Avatar. 

Though The Way Of Water absolutely deserved its gong, we wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight if we didn’t acknowledge some of the stellar work done by the other nominees.  

All Quiet On The Western Front may not have boasted the type of showy visual effects seen on Pandora, but Frank Petzold, Viktor Müller, Markus Frank and Kamil Jafar’s work on this acclaimed drama helped bring the First World War to life once more.  

Full marks also go to Top Gun: Maverick (Ryan Tudhope, Seth Hill, Bryan Litson and Scott R. Fisher). Although Tom Cruise likes to point out how many real stunts were performed in the movie, it actually relied quite heavily on CGI – the F-14 and Su-57 jets were entirely visualised by computer. 

Finally, The Batman and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever both showed how visual effects are crucial in creating realistic, if fantastical environments for superhero worlds. Though Marvel are habitually nominated for the Best Visual Effects award, amazingly they’ve yet to scoop the big prize. Considering how virtually every frame of a MCU movie has some kind of digital component to it, and how sumptuously detailed those worlds are, it’s staggering that they haven’t picked up an Oscar. Hint, hint, Academy! 

So, now that 2023’s Oscars are done and dusted, which films have we got in our sights for the 2024 awards? Will Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 finally win them one of the little golden fellas, or will Transformers: Rise of the Beasts beat them to it? There’s also The Flash and Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part One. And from what we’ve seen of the de-aging of Harrison Ford for June’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, this is next-level visual effects of the first order. 

Have you honed your VFX, motion picture or gaming industry skills?

If so, we’ve got some opportunities that will turn your head. Get in touch with our mustard FX team, and we’ll put you in the picture, if you’ll pardon the pun!