Ah, the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. What other category at the Oscars has made room to nominate films as eclectic as “Deepwater Horizon,” “Doctor Dolittle,” “The Golden Compass,“ and “Free Guy?” With this historical track record, the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects category can truly go anywhere. This is one of the rare categories not exclusively dictated by film festival favorites or Best Picture contenders. Even other technical categories like Best Makeup & Hairstyling tend to be dominated by British period pieces or other standard Oscar fare. Meanwhile, Best Visual Effects can make room for truly inspired nominees like “Snow White & The Huntsman“ and “Hereafter.” Now that we’re past the halfway point of 2024, it’s worth asking: What 2024 features will next enter the hallowed halls of this category? What movies from the first half of the year or the upcoming months will join the likes of “Star Wars,” “Titanic,” “Avatar,” “Gravity,” and yes, even first “Dune,” in Best Visual Effects Oscar history?
Let’s make something perfectly clear: Right now, this category belongs to “Dune: Part Two.” The original “Dune” won this category back at the 94th Academy Awards. Flash-forward three years later, its sequel has garnered even more acclaim while pushing visual effects boundaries even further to turn Arrakis into a truly immersive cinematic realm. Now that “Dune: Part Two” has become a pop culture phenomenon in part (among other factors) because of its glorious visual spectacle, the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects is well and truly “Dune: Part Two’s” to lose.
Unless Stan Winston descends from the heavens with a piece of animatronic magic we’ve never even dreamed of before, the latest “Dune” movie will have no trouble fending off other 2024 contenders. The Visual Effects branch of the Academy is not opposed to rewarding sequels either as they’ve done so since 1980 with “The Empire Strikes Back,” “Indiana Jones And The Temple of Doom,” “Aliens,” “Terminator 2: Judgment Day,” “The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers” (and “Return Of The King“), “Spider-Man 2,” “Pirates of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest,” “Blade Runner 2049,” and “Avatar: The Way Of Water.”
With “Dune: Part Two” a frontrunner for an Oscar win, are there any other first-half of 2024 movies that could get nominated in the category? “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” is undoubtedly a surefire nominee in this domain, given the rampant praise for its VFX wizardry. The last three “Apes” installments also scored Best Visual Effects nominations throughout the 2010s. That’s a good historical track record to build on.
Beyond “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes,” though, it may be challenging for other movies from 2024’s first six months to break into the Best Visual Effects category. “Furiosa,” for instance, certainly has the groundbreaking VFX techniques and critical praise to get into this category. Plus, “Mad Max: Fury Road” was nominated in this category nine years ago. However, “Furiosa’s” muted box office run may lead to it falling off voters’ radar once 2025 rolls around. “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire,” meanwhile, has lots of CG mayhem on display in its runtime; however, no MonsterVerse installment has been bestowed a Best Visual Effects nomination since “Kong: Skull Island” in 2017. Don’t count on these dueling beasts appearing at the Dolby Auditorium next year.
Alex Garland’s “Civil War“ could be a stealthy dark horse candidate for a Best Visual Effects nomination if it picks up steam in other major award season categories. Never forget that Garland’s indie “Ex Machina“ beat out 2015 blockbusters like “The Martian“ and “Star Wars: The Force Awakens“ for a Best Visual Effects Oscar win. Meanwhile, there’s been some chatter online about “Inside Out 2“ becoming a rare fully-animated film to secure a Best Visual Effects nomination; however, if “Soul“ and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” couldn’t get into that category in the 2020s, “Inside Out 2” doesn’t stand a chance.
From the first six months of 2024, it’s pretty apparent that “Dune: Part Two” is a massive frontrunner that will inevitably take home the Best Visual Effects Oscar. Only “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” seems guaranteed to score a nomination in this category, let alone maybe have a feeble chance of usurping “Dune: Part Two” for the Oscar. But what about the second half of the year? Could anything emerge from 2024’s last six months that gives the latest Denis Villeneuve movie a run for its money?
The incoming massive blockbuster, “Deadpool & Wolverine,” could certainly be seen, on paper, as a big Best Visual Effects contender. After all, starting with the 89th Academy Awards, eight different Marvel Studios titles have secured Best Visual Effects Oscar nominations. Every year since 2015, Marvel Studios has released at least one project that has wound up in the Best Visual Effects race. The only recent Best Visual Effects Race devoid of Marvel Studios came with the 93rd Oscars, which celebrated a year of cinema that didn’t have new Marvel Studios releases.
Given that “Deadpool & Wolverine” is the only Marvel Studios movie on the docket for 2024, it could be a Best Visual Effects nominee and maybe a dark horse winner for the category; however, no Marvel Studios project has ever actually won the Oscar, a historical track record automatically knocking “Deadpool & Wolverine” down as a potential “Dune: Part Two” challenger. A little over a month after “Deadpool & Wolverine,” will “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice“ hit theaters with practical effects that could be up the alley of Best Visual Effects voters; however, given that it’s unlikely a modern Tim Burton movie will get the kind of rampant nominations “Dune: Part Two“ is bound to receive, beating it will be a long shot, even for a new movie starring the king of unpredictable chaos.
Christmas 2024 blockbuster, “Mufasa: The Lion King,” meanwhile, is unlikely to score a Best Visual Effects win, considering its predecessor lost to “1917” five years ago. Looking over the slate of movies dropping in the final six months of 2024, the biggest challenger to “Dune: Part Two” for the rest of 2024 seems to be “Gladiator II.” For starters, it’s the only other VFX-driven film in 2024 (save for “Wicked“) that has the potential to become a big-time Oscar player in all categories. The original “Gladiator” is a Best Picture winner, after all. That prestige is hard to replicate, even for a master like Denis Villeneuve.
Director Ridley Scott’s entire filmography is built on visual effects that have transformed the film industry. Not only did “Alien” and “Gladiator” each win the Best Visual Effects Oscars, but “Blade Runner,” “The Martian,” and countless other Scott titles have reshaped the visual scheme of modern sci-fi cinema. Scott’s legacy in the visual effects world is rich and deeply respected. Heck, his 2023 period piece epic, “Napoleon,” just scored a Best Visual Effects nomination last year.
Given the early hype surrounding “Gladiator II” and the impressive Oscar legacy of the original “Gladiator,” that follow-up could be the one main contender to “Dune: Part Two” at the end of the year. Still, even Ridley Scott’s newest Roman epic will have difficulty dethroning “Dune: Part Two” as the Best Visual Effects Oscar frontrunner for the year. Will it be Robert Zemeckis’s “Here” as we discussed in another recent article? Or perhaps Steve McQueen’s “Blitz” will have the kind of supporting visual effects the Academy likes to embrace? Only time will tell which 2024 feature wins this category and joins an eclectic line of winners that includes “Cocoon,” “Ex Machina,” and “Marooned.”
Do you think “Dune: Part Two” is the frontrunner for the Best Visual Effects Oscar? Or can something else overtake it? Please let us know in the comments section below or on Next Best Picture’s X account and be sure to check out the Next Best Picture team’s latest Oscar predictions here.
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