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The Oscars are done for another year and Christopher Nolan and Cillian Murphy are newly minted Oscar winners for Oppenheimer! Overall, it was an expected and welcome result, with Oppenheimer also taking home Best Picture, while Poor Things star Emma Stone won a second Oscar, in a surprising, but well-earned result. Overall, it was the icing on the cake of a refreshingly entertaining edition of the Oscars – one of the best in years.

Right off the bat it was pretty amusing, Jimmy Kimmel made some pretty fun digs in his opening monologue, including some references to Robert Downey Jr’s checkered history (which he was happy to play along to) and Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling’s genetic perfection (he ain’t wrong). Plus, there was a close-up of Anatomy of a Fall’s breakout dog star, Messi (who showed up despite earlier giving the award show the high hat...

My, how much the race has evolved since the 96th Oscars nominations were announced January 23. We won’t say changed, since it seems like the certain sure bets at that time have become even surer bets. You all know “Oppenheimer,” long considered a frontrunner in many categories,” received the most nominations then with 13, followed by “Poor Things” with 11 and “Killers of the Flower Moon” with 10. Well, tonight, this evening of Sunday March 10 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles at 7:00pm Et, we’re finally gonna see if what we all assume to be true is actually going to pan out: That “Oppenheimer” is teed up for a very big night, as IndieWire’s own Anne Thompson has predicted, with her final Oscar picks, herself.

“Oppenheimer” has won top honors at the Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards, BAFTAs, and Screen Actors Guild Awards. Surely Oscars domination is next, right?...

One man is preparing for a “quite unbelievable” Oscars night, having found himself nominated three times this year in the same category.

Special effects supervisor Neil Corbould is up against himself twice over, after being recognised in the category for his work on three movies – Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One, The Creator and Napoleon.

Corbould has two previous Oscars to his name – for Gladiator and Gravity. He told the BBC that this year’s close-to-hand competition could be “the kiss of death,” and said:

“I might have three seats and have to play musical chairs!” The best part? “I get invited to three different after parties.”

Corbould has been working in the film industry for nearly five decades, having followed his uncle into special effects. Colin Chilvers previously won an Oscar himself, for his work on the 1978 movie Superman. He also worked on The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Condorman...

Variety Awards Circuit section is the home for all awards news and related content throughout the year, featuring the following: the official predictions for the upcoming Oscars, Emmys, Grammys and Tony Awards ceremonies, curated by Variety senior awards editor Clayton Davis. The prediction pages reflect the current standings in the race and do not reflect personal preferences for any individual contender. As other formal (and informal) polls suggest, competitions are fluid and subject to change based on buzz and events. Predictions are updated every Thursday.

Visit the prediction pages for the respective ceremonies via the links below:

Oscars | Emmys | Grammys | Tonys

2024 Oscars Predictions:

Best Achievement in Visual Effects

Weekly Commentary: “The Creator” has the advantage, but honesty, any film can win.

“Godzilla Minus One” is in the discussion and could be a cool choice for the Academy to make, similar to “Ex Machina.” However, don’t count out the power...

The films in the running for the 2024 Best Visual Effects Oscar are “The Creator,” “Godzilla Minus One,” “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” and “Napoleon.” Our odds currently indicate that “Godzilla Minus One” (10/3) is the frontrunner, followed in order by “The Creator” (18/5), the new “Guardians” entry (9/2), “Napoleon” (9/2), and the latest “Mission: Impossible” chapter (9/2).

Included among the 17 individuals in this lineup are 13 first-timers who constitute the category’s largest newcomer rate since the minimum annual amount of nominated films was set at five in 2011. This vast majority comprises all four “Godzilla Minus One” team members, dual contender Simone Coco (“Mission: Impossible” and “Napoleon”), three artists from “The Creator”, two from “Guardians of the Galaxy” (Theo Bialek and Alexis Wajsbrot), two more from “Mission: Impossible” (Jeff Sutherland and Alex Wuttke), and one more from “Napoleon” (Luc-Ewen Martin-Fenouillet).

The third “Guardians” volume is the 14th Marvel...

The Creator won big at the 22nd annual Visual Effects Society Awards Wednesday night.

The awards were handed out during a ceremony, hosted by actor-comedian Jay Pharoah, at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles.

The Creator took home five awards in the feature competition, including outstanding visual effects in a photoreal feature. The Last of Us was also a top winner in the series categories, scoring four awards, and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse led the animation competition with four wins.

Other winners of the night included Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Oppenheimer, Nyad, The Mandalorian and The Flash.

It was previously announced that producer Joyce Cox, who produced VFX on movies including Avatar and The Dark Knight, received the Society’s Lifetime Achievement Award during the ceremony.

Actor-producer-director William Shatner was also previously revealed as the recipient of the award for Creative Excellence in “recognition of his valuable contributions...

Gareth Edwards’ “The Creator” was the big winner at the 22nd Visual Effects Society Awards (held February 21 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel). The AI-themed, sci-fi actioner earned five awards, including the top photoreal feature VFX prize. The other awards were for modeling (Nomad), created environment (Floating Village), effects simulations, and compositing & lighting (Bar).

“The Creator” utilized an innovative streamlining process in post, in which Ilm designed and placed the naturalistic VFX over the actors playing AI simulants and the photographic plates as set extensions. This made the $80 million indie look like a $200 million blockbuster, with director Edwards shooting the entire film guerilla-style in 80 locations throughout Southeast Asia as the primary camera operator with a small crew and natural light.

Meanwhile, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” the animated feature Oscar favorite (snubbed by the Academy’s VFX branch), took home four awards, including the top animated VFX prize. Sony Pictures Imageworks innovated...

As had been generally expected, Gareth Edwards’ futuristic sci-fi film “The Creator” proved to be the favorite among visual effects practitioners. The film topped the feature competition at the 22nd Visual Effects Society Awards, claiming five wins including one in the leading category for outstanding VFX in a photoreal feature.

Wednesday night at the Beverly Hilton, it also won the categories for created environment, model, compositing and lighting and effects simulations. Also, in the feature competition, “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” collected two awards for the digital character (the emotive Rocket) and virtual cinematography. “Oppenheimer” grabbed the trophy for practical effects, and “Nyad” took home the award for supporting VFX. Sony Pictures Animation’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” was the big winner among the animated features, collecting four awards.

“The Creator,” whose VFX was led by Industrial Light + Magic, and Guardians 3, whose work was shared by roughly 10 VFX companies,...

Best Visual Effects is one of my personal favorite Oscar categories, but this year it’s one without a single Best Picture nominee in the bunch, which isn’t that uncommon — it happened most recently in 2020. Not that it necessarily matters, since not a single movie that has won Best Picture has also won this category going all the way back to Peter Jackson‘s “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” in 2003. In fact, that was the last Best Picture winner to even be nominated in this category.

Two of the movies nominated this year received no other nominations, while the others only received one or two additional below-the-line bids. What’s interesting is that there is only one visual effects nominee that is also nominated for its production design: Ridley Scott‘s “Napoleon,” which only received three below-the-line nominations total. In most years that would...

Director James Gunn brought a new level of emotional power to “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” by making the wisecracking Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) and his tragic backstory the centerpiece of the finale. This required the Oscar-nominated VFX (led by Marvel’s production VFX supervisor Stéphane Ceretti) to up its game considerably to meet the demands of Gunn’s intimate scale and epic scope.

Framestore (led by VFX supervisor Alexis Wajsbrot) was tasked with expanding and improving its keyframe animation of Rocket through six stages, from genetically altered baby raccoon to hardened weapons expert. This allowed for greater nuance and complexity in the facial performance along with more detailed fur and an evolved gait and physiology. “It’s really a chain of artists that work together and get that to the level where other humans looking at it are crying because of a CG raccoon,” Ceretti told IndieWire in the video below.

2024 BAFTA Awards Nominations Unveiled ( Photo Credit – IMDb; Facebook )

After the Emmys and Golden Globes, it’s time for the British Academy Film Awards or the BAFTA Awards 2024. The nominations have been unveiled, with Oppenheimer again enjoying multiple nods at the prestigious awards. Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo’s Poor Things has also earned numerous nominations.

The streaming giant Lionsgate Play will telecast the event live, and eminent actor David Tennant will host it. The ceremony will take place at the Royal Festival Hall in London. The first ceremony was held in 1949 and was telecasted on the BBC. There are over twenty film-related categories. Keep scrolling for more.

Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer has received 13 nominations at the BAFTA Film Awards 2024, followed by 11 nominations by Poor Things and nine nods by Killers of the Flower Moon. Margot Robbie led Barbie, which is lagging and has only five nods.

Trending Did Jason Momoa...

“Oppenheimer,” “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” and “The Last of Us” are among the nominees for the Visual Effects Society (Ves) Awards.

Gareth Edwards’ “The Creator” leads the feature film field with seven nominations. “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” is the top animated contender with seven nominations and 24-time Emmy-nominated drama “The Last of Us” leads the episodic field with six nominations.

“The artistry, ingenuity and passion of visual effects practitioners around the world have come together to create remarkable imagery,” Ves chair Kim Davidson said. “We are seeing best-in-class work that elevates the art of storytelling and exemplifies the spirit of innovation. The Ves Awards is the only venue that showcases and honors these outstanding artists across a wide range of disciplines, and we are extremely proud of our nominees.”

The Ves is a global honorary society dedicated to “advancing the arts, sciences and applications of visual effects and to upholding...

The Visual Effects Society has composited the nominees for its 22nd annual Ves Awards, which will be handed out next month. Disney’s The Creator and Sony’s Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse lead the field with seven noms apiece, and HBO’s The Last of Us tops TV with six. See the full list below.

The annual Ves Awards will be handed out during the group’s 22nd annual ceremony February 21 at the Beverly Hilton. They recognize outstanding visual effects artistry and innovation in 25 categories spanning features, animation, television, commercials and video games and the VFX supervisors, VFX producers and hands-on artists who bring this work to life.

“The artistry, ingenuity and passion of visual effects practitioners around the world have come together to create remarkable imagery,” said Kim Davidson, newly elected Ves Chair. “We are seeing best-in-class work that elevates the art of storytelling and exemplifies the spirit of innovation.

The Spider-Society has webbed in a few honors. The Visual Effects Society has announced their nominations for the 22nd annual Ves Awards, with “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” leading the pack.

Held every winter, the Ves Awards honor the best achievements in visual effects artistry over the previous calendar year, with VFX professionals in film, television, video games, and commercials receiving recognition. Nominees in 25 categories are selected by Ves members through a process of 39 in-person and virtual nomination events, held worldwide and conducted during a 36-hour period. A minimum of three judging panels review each submission for the awards, looking at “Before and Afters” for each prospective nominee. Ves judging panels this year included members of the society from 25 different countries.

“Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” was the top animated film to receive nominations this year, gaining seven nominations including Outstanding Effects in an Animated Feature and specific nods for modeling, character animation,...

It took a village of 10 visual effects houses, including Weta FX and Framestore, and 3066 visual effects shots to help bring James Gunn’s “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” to life over 15 months of post-production.

From studying baby raccoons for the backstory of Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) to golden retrievers for talking dog Cosmo, the VFX supervisors spent months putting together the sequences — some with explosions and complex action, including the film’s already iconic two-minute one-shot scene timed perfectly to the beats of the Beastie Boys’ “No Sleep Till Brooklyn.”

The teams break down the process behind some of their VFX magic and how they navigated some of the most challenging scenes.

Cosmo Cosmo (voiced by Maria Bakalova)

When it came to creating Cosmo, the photoreal dog voiced by Maria Bakalova, Stephane Naze, VFX supervisor for Framestore, says the team pulled together photos and footage of a real dog and made it CG.

Academy Award-winning VFX house Framestore once again reunited with James Gunn to bring stunning special effects to life for the ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ Holiday special. We have an exclusive first look behind the scenes of the VFX breakdown of bringing not only giving life to Knowhere – the home of our motley crew but some of our favourite characters too.

VFX Supervisor Alexis Wajsbrot led Framestore’s teams across London, Montreal, Vancouver and Mumbai to deliver 271 shots for the Disney+ special, primarily in the Guardians’ celestial home, Knowhere.

Featured in the video, for one, is Cosmo the dog, Wajsbrot said “She’s a photoreal dog, but is able to talk via speakers in her space suit. This means that while there’s a need for facial expressions and performative cues that reflect the speech, we don’t need her to move her jaw in order to ‘talk’, which helps the...

This post contains spoilers for Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness.

Despite what its title promised, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness delivered a relatively limited view of alternate universes. Most of the action took place either in the main MCU reality or on Earth-818, home to the Illuminati, Billy and Tommy Maximoff, and, of course, Pizza Poppa. We did get a brief glimpse of several different realities as Strange and America Chavez blasted through the multiverse, but most flashed by so quickly that we couldn’t make sense of what they were.

In an interview with Cinematography World, digital effects team Framestore sheds some light on these other worlds. Visual effects supervisor Alexis Wajsbrot compared the portal sequence to “being given a blank sheet of paper to work with.” With so much open space, Wajsbrot and the team could spit-ball crazy ideas: “okay, why don’t we add some dinosaurs here?...

A bunch of sequels and a remake are vying for the Best Visual Effects Oscar this year, many of them from Disney, including Bill Condon’s live-action remake of Disney’s classic “Beauty and the Beast,” Marvel’s “Thor: Ragnarok” and Lucasfilm’s upcoming “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.”

Three Fox films offer stunning VFX: “War for the Planet of the Apes,” which advances its visual effects technology over the last Matt Reeves installment featuring Weta Digital’s astonishing array of digital apes led by performance capture master Andy Serkis as Caesar, could win Weta’s Joe Letteri (“Avatar,” “King Kong,” “The Lord of the Rings”) his fifth Oscar. Another visually sumptuous sequel is Denis Villeneuve’s “Blade Runner 2049.” And Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water” is also impressive.

Two Warner Bros. blockbusters, Christopher Nolan’s World War II epic “Dunkirk” and Patty Jenkins’ World War I superhero origin myth “Wonder Woman,...

There are a lot of horror films which are marketed toward the teenage audience and this is where Don’t Hang Up fits in. Unfortunately, this is also where it is likely to get lost. Writer Joe Johnson creates an interesting concept, with some clever twists in the story, but there is nothing in the film which really makes it stand out. Horror fans have seen this done countless times before, with the film taking notes from others such as Saw, they will be able to foresee most of the events before they unfold.

Directors Damien Macé and Alexis Wajsbrot do however show some promise with their feature debut. The opening sequence where a call is received, plays on the classic theme of ‘There’s an intruder in the house’. It may not be the most original idea, but the scene works well to slowly build up a tense atmosphere.

This Week in Home VideoPlus 7 more new releases to watch at home this week on Blu-ray/DVD.

Welcome to this week in home video! Click the title to buy a Blu-ray/DVD from Amazon and help support Fsr in the process!

Pick of the WeekPaterson

What is it? A bus driver writes poetry in his spare time about the world and stuff.

Why see it? The brief summation above is pretty much accurate in describing the whole of Jim Jarmusch’s latest, but it doesn’t begin to capture the warmth, humor, and humanity the film delivers. Adam Driver plays the title role and creates a character far removed from the easily antagonized and disgruntled ones he’s best known for. His Paterson is a simple man of simple pleasures, but while most films would mock or sideline him here he’s embraced. Even better, his demeanor and perception of the world are remarkably calming and infectious...

Welcome back to the Weekend Warrior, your weekly look at the new movies hitting theaters this weekend, as well as other cool events and things to check out.

This Past Weekend:

Bomb, bomb bomb bomb, Boooooomb! Things just kept getting worse and worse at the box office as this past weekend saw more new releases not meeting up to their potential. The horribly-reviewed horror movie Rings (Paramount) ended up around where I predicted with $13 million, taking second place to M. Night Shyamalan’s Split. The sci-fi romance The Space Between Us (Stx Entertainment) didn’t make much of a mark, opening in ninth place with just $3.8 million with about $1,300 per theater. Robert De Niro’s The Comedian (Sony Classics) tanked worse than many recent movies, making less than a million in 848 theaters or about $1,000 per theater. By comparison, the doc I Am Not Your Negro made about 78% of that amount in 800 less theaters.

The 2016 Los Angeles Film Festival kicks off on Wednesday, June 1st, and this year’s Nightfall lineup looks to be yet another strong selection of genre films set to thrill festival-goers night after night.

For those of you in the southern California area, the 2016 Laff runs through Thursday, June 9th and is calling the ArcLight Culver City Cinema home this year. Here’s a look at what we’re anticipating once the Laff begins later this week, and for more information on the festival, please visit:

http://www.filmindependent.org/la-film-festival/

Abattoir (directed by Darren Lynn Bousman)

Full disclosure: Abattoir was edited by my significant other, so I am certainly biased, but my enthusiasm for the film comes from my excitement to see Bousman return to the hardboiled world of horror after working on The Devil’s Carnival musicals and his comedy-infused segment in last year’s Tales of Halloween anthology.

Don't Hang Up is a new horror film from directors Alexis Wajsbrot and Damien Macé. Slated to have its World Premiere at the La Film Festival, this indie title involves two teenage boys and the prank calls they play. Those calls come back to haunt them. The film stars: Gregg Sulkin (Anti-social), Garrett Clayton, Bella Dayne and Sienna Gulillory. And, a couple of a stills from the film have been released, before the premiere. A longer synopsis talks about how the two teenage boys have become internet sensations. They post their prank calls online. But then, the tables are turned. Now, one humiliated victim has a bloody prank of his own to play. The first stills from the film show the boys and character Peyton (Dayne). Sam (Sulkin) and Brady (Clayton) appear worried, while Peyton stares into a recording device. A trailer is coming soon. For now, fans of horror...

Gravity earns six prizes, Frozen four at 12th annual Visual Effects Society awards.

It was a big night for two of the dominant films of the awards season as the prizes were handed out in Los Angeles on February 12.

Film category winners of the 12th Annual Ves Awards:

Outstanding Visual Effects In A Visual Effects-Driven Feature Motion Picture

Gravity

(Tim Webber, Nikki Penny, Neil Corbould, Richard McBride)

Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects In A Feature Motion Picture

The Lone Ranger

(Tim Alexander, Gary Brozenich, Shari Hanson, Kevin Martel)

Outstanding Animation In An Animated Feature Motion Picture

Frozen

(Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, Peter Del Vecho, Lino Di Salvo)

Outstanding Animated Character In A Live Action Feature Motion Picture

The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug

Smaug

(Eric Reynolds, David Clayton, Myriam Catrin, Guillaume Francois)

Outstanding Animated Character In An Animated Feature Motion Picture

Frozen: Bringing the Snow Queen to Life

(Alexander Alvarado, Joy Johnson, [link...

Today was a busy day for some of the smaller guilds with the Visual Effects Society, the Cinema Audio Society, and the Makeup and Hairstylists Guilds all announcing their nominations for 2013.

First, we have the Ves, whose main category to look at is “Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects-Driven Feature Motion Picture,” where we find Gravity and four other nominees that are just going to have to be happy with the fact that they got nominated. This is perhaps the easiest category to call in the entirety of awards season, and I don’t mean just here, but for the Oscar as well (Last year’s winner, Life of Pi, easily took this category before going on to claim the Oscar). It’s true that films like The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and Star Trek Into Darkness had outstanding effects as well, but nothing even came close to the amazing,...

Ile de France Film Commission unveils ParisFX line-up. Filmmaker Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Dreamworks animation chief Kristof Serrand among speakers.

French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and his longtime visual effects expert Alain Carsoux will be among the top speakers at the Ile De France Film Commission’s annual ParisFX conference running Dec 4-5.

Carsoux, whose career kicked off as a digital compositor on Jeunet’s The City of Lost Children, now has more than 100 films credits to his name, including most recently Grace of Monaco and Turning Tide.

He will discuss his recent work on Jeunet’s The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet, which hit screens in France in October, and will also participate in a conversation with the director on their 20-year collaboration, which also included working together on the worldwide hit Amélie.

Other key speakers in the two-day conference devoted to the special effects industry, the programme of which was unveiled by the Ile de France...

It is common in horror films to use childhood relics as ominous symbols, and "Red Balloon" uses that conceit effectively. This short film marks the directorial debut of visual effects duo Damien Mace and Alexis Wajsbrot. The story is nothing groundbreaking - a young woman is baby-sitting when things go awry - but the film is a chilling and stylish 13 minutes. Check it out after the break, but be forewarned: Dailymotion embeds commercials every five minutes, regardless of where you are in the story (it can be jarring).

FrightFest’s International Short Film Showcase returns to the festival with a bang. Featuring zombies, vampires, monsters and madness… Oh, and wrestlers… and killer household appliances! Also screening in this years showcase is The End – a new short from Marc Price, the director of the £45 zombie flick Colin.

If any of these short films is half as good as Deadspeil, the zombie-curling short shown at FrightFest Glasgow earlier this year, then the London audience is in for a treat. The full list:

2.22 (USA, 8.30 mins)

Dir. Steven Shea

A night out with the girls. A hot new club and a hot new guy. For Vickie Palmer, yesterday would be her last day.

To My Mother And Father (UK/Turkey, 8.45 mins)

Dir. Can Evrenol

When Jimmy is left alone in his house he discovers an old mask and decides to scare his parents upon their arrival home.

Bon Appetit (UK, 3.49 mins)

Dir.