I'm not going to write another article about Hollywood's desperate need for originality (I've done it recently, and almost certainly will do it later this summer when we get a fuller picture of what did & didn't perform), but with Indiana Jones now premiered, we're weirdly coming close to the end of our summer blockbuster season. Summer blockbuster season is actually more of a May-July thing, rather than a Memorial Day to Labor Day scenario, and while we have four big films coming up (Oppenheimer, Barbie, Haunted Mansion, and Mission Impossible 7), that's pretty much it. This means that we should have a pretty good handle on one of my favorite Oscar categories to discuss...but this year we don't. I thought it'd be fun to take a mid-year look at the race for Best Visual Effects at this year's Oscars.
Until recently, I would've counted Dial of Destiny on the list of sure things. The buzz for it before Cannes was good (man did Disney make some mistakes with opening that at Cannes before they'd done test audiences, which purportedly was their game play to avoid spoilers leaking), and while Kingdom of the Crystal Skull missed, the other three didn't. But while it could get there, the race feels like we have only three sure things, two of which haven't opened so "sure thing" would be more correctly in quotations.
The first is Dune 2 (you'll find that I don't usually use the longer or fancier titles as a rule for sequels because I think we should underline that we're not on Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, we're on Transformers 7, which is as creatively bankrupt as we can get in Hollywood). The first film won, and the trailers for the second film seem like it's up a notch-it's the heavy favorite to win again this year. The second would be Oppenheimer, which opens in a few weeks. Christopher Nolan is not infallible in this category (he missed for The Dark Knight Rises), but given the pressure on this film to perform, and that there's no bad buzz wafting off of it yet, I think this makes it.
And the third is Guardians of the Galaxy 3. MCU has only missed twice since 2008 when they had an eligible film (2011 & 2015), and in a year bereft of major contenders (that don't come with baggage), a film where both of the predecessors made it, the film made a profit, and the movie was noted by most critics (me included) for having the best cinematography we've seen in eons for an MCU film (at least since Eternals), there's no way it doesn't make it (and end up losing...this ain't the year the MCU's losing streak in this category ends).
So let's assume those three are nominated. That means we've got two more to go. One of the bigger questions at this point, if Oscar isn't in the mood for box office bombs or getting outside his comfort zone (more on both in a second) is if he throws a bone to a film with supporting or limited budget effects. This happens occasionally (recent examples include The Irishman, Ex Machina, and The Midnight Sky), but it's rarer than you'd think. Everything Everywhere All at Once and The Shape of Water were actual Best Picture winners that couldn't land a nomination here. It's also worth noting that this slot might be filled by Oppenheimer-as we haven't seen the movie yet, we don't know yet whether or not this movie is going to be the "supporting effects" nominee (there's usually just one, if any).
By my measure, there's three upcoming films that will have at least some supporting effects (or less expensive effects) that could be a threat here. Killers of the Flower Moon clearly has some effects, and Scorsese proved with The Irishman and Hugo that you shouldn't count him out of this category, but it's not clear from the trailer how effects-heavy this will be. Poor Things is for sure effects heavy based on the trailer, but it's Yorgos Lanthimos, and while The Favourite was a huge hit with Oscar, his films are specific enough that I think we're still case-by-case if Oscar will indulge. And then there's Barbie, which will have effects (though it's gone to great lengths to point out how little CGI is in the film itself, making a play for Production Design & Costume instead). If it's a massive hit (and I'm sure Warner Brothers is praying it is), don't count it out here though.
Guardians of the Galaxy being in my "sure things" bucket means that comic book movies are already represented here, but it's worth noting in the past ten years three of those years had at least two nominated comic book films in Visual Effects, so it's possible another nomination is in the comic book realm.
The DCEU has never been nominated for a Best Visual Effects Oscar (the first Suicide Squad movie is the only film in the collection to be nominated in ANY category), and I don't know that I expect that to happen on the wings of a massive flop like The Flash, and while I think Aquaman 2 could be a big hit (even if Flash and Blue Beetle tank), I don't see it being an Oscar contender unless it approaches its original's box office. Even movies like Wonder Woman, which came armed with critical success, couldn't land here.
So it'd be Marvel where we'd probably get the nomination, and with Ant-Man 3 being regularly attacked for actively bad visual effects, the only option from the MCU is The Marvels, which I think might have the best effects of the three (based solely on the trailer), but the original movie didn't get nominated (despite showy de-aging for Samuel L. Jackson) and I'm a little worried about the box office on this one given the animosity male MCU fans have for Brie Larson's character. Arguably the best option for another VFX nod is Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. The movie is making mountains of cash (well-exceeding its predecessor), and even its detractors argue that it looks marvelous. But it's animated, and that's only happened twice (and in both cases, for stop motion). It has the whiff of a film that gets in for the shortlist but not the Top 5.
Oscar has his preferences, and especially in Visual Effects he has franchises that he loves and some that he hates. There are four series this year where Oscar has (to date) never nominated the series in either Visual Effects or in any category, despite all four franchises being box office behemoths at one time (or the present time). I doubt that this is the year that Fast X gets into the race, given that Oscar had better chances to nominate it at the peak of its fame and declined (and this film has been a flop domestically even if internationally it'll make a profit).
John Wick 4 is undoubtedly a hit (and supposedly a creative dynamo), and sometimes Oscar suddenly cares when those combine at a key point for a franchise (see The Bourne Ultimatum getting a trio of Oscars after the rest of the franchise was skipped), but I'll believe it when I see it. The same can be said for Mission Impossible 7 and the Hunger Games prequel The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, both of which have a lot of studio hope behind them given the performance of the previous installments, but in both cases Oscar has had plenty of time and never warmed to them-why would he change now? A shortlist position for at least one of these four seems probable, but an actual nomination...?
Which gets us to three films that Oscar has loved in the past, and whose biggest hangups are their box office. It's worth noting that with at least two of them (Indiana Jones we'll wait and see) it's less that they were outright flops (which I think ends up being the case for The Flash) and more disappointments, as both The Little Mermaid and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts will end up in the black before all is said and done (Transformers is tracking to at least hit $400 million, The Little Mermaid is well-past $500 million), but that they were both potentially gargantuan hits that spell not only disappointment, but likely a potential end to their lucrative franchises as they've gotten too risky.
All three have a shot of making it, though. While Transformers hasn't been in the mix for a nomination here since 2011, a reboot of sorts could've done the trick. Indiana Jones also didn't make it for its last installment, but a reboot gave off the vibes of a series that might come back into the fold like Planet of the Apes did. In both cases, I wonder if we're looking at shortlists but no nomination at this point. Of these three, I think The Little Mermaid, which is the one that Disney has the biggest long-term investment in (given the live-action remake wagon is all they have lately), is probably in the best position to get in. You have to remember that The Lion King, Snow White and the Huntsman, and Maleficent, and Christopher Robin all got in this category, and were all retellings of famous Disney stories. I wouldn't be stunned if The Little Mermaid repeated that, even if I would argue many of the effects in the film are pretty ugly.
One thing I'll say right now-an original film featuring effects and being a surprise hit would definitely be something that Oscar would latch onto if audiences grant him the opportunity. Probably the best option for that would be something like The Creator, made by the director of Rogue One, and starring John David Washington (very much still in Tenet mode). If it's good this has sleeper hit written all over it, and that would make life a lot easier on AMPAS.
Otherwise, I don't see a lot of truly original creations coming out later this year, though there are some effects films that we don't know the extent of their effects (and obviously don't yet know their box office). Ghostbusters: Afterlife 2 is the sequel to a film that did surprisingly well at the box office (note-it did well because it had a budget of $75 million...which perhaps a few other films on this list should've considered), and was shortlisted in 2021 for an Oscar nod. Wonka is definitely going to be a big deal later this year, and could give us double the Chalamet in this category. And lastly, there's The Color Purple, which (based on the trailer) is going to be far more effects-heavy than you'd have guessed if you're solely familiar with the original film or Alice Walker novel. This early in the year, I wouldn't count any of these movies out, though they'd still count as a surprise from my current vantage point.
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