‘Avatar’ Visual Effects Oscar Winners Played Off In James Cameron-Free Speech; Jimmy Kimmel Jokes They Had Wanted To Announce Their After-Party At “CGI Fridays”
deadline.comThe team behind Avatar: The Way of Water‘s long-expected Oscar win for Visual Effects learned first-hand how committed Academy officials and show producers are to keeping things moving.
Richard Baneham, one of four winners along with Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon and Daniel Barrett, took the trophy first and thanked director James Cameron, who was not in attendance.
He also shouted out producer Jon Landau and a range of technical colleagues. Just as the Academy-allotted 45 second expired, music swelled abruptly and the camera panned away just as Saindon was heard saying, “We need to thank our families–” As applause died down, the camera found Oscar host Jimmy Kimmel, who appeared to be ready for the play-off. “It’s unfortunate,” he said. “I happen to know before he was cut off, the Avatar visual effects team asked me to announce that if anyone’s interested, the visual effects after-party is at CGI Fridays.” There may not have been a bigger lock heading into Oscar night than the Avatar sequel in visual effects, one of four categories in which it was nominated.
Released 15 years after the original film, it cleared the previous outing’s extremely high bar. The immersive effects helped make the film a huge draw in Imax auditoriums.
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