Oscars shortlist voting begins today in eight categories, and the Academy’s Visual Effects branch has notified studios and streamers of a 20-title shortlist that will be whittled down to 10 this week before the so-called bakeoff stage that sees VFX artists presenting their work.
The Academy has not announced the 20 films on the list, though Variety has confirmed 19 of the titles, which include frontrunners such as Avatar: The Way of Water and Top Gun: Maverick.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was among a handful of comic book movies that were included, such as The Batman, Black Adam, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and Thor: Love and Thunder.
But it wasn’t just superhero movies that made the shortlist, as foreign-language films All Quiet on the Western Front and Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu’s Netflix comedy Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths were also included, as was India’s action epic RRR. A documentary even made the list — Amazon’s Good Night Oppy — and it could be joined by another one, as the 20th feature on the current shortlist remains unknown.
Following the bakeoff stage, this year’s five nominees for Best Visual Effects will be unveiled when the Academy announces the full list of Oscar nominations on Jan. 24. Here’s the list as it stands right now, according to Variety:
All Quiet on the Western Front (Netflix)
Avatar: The Way of Water (20th Century Studios)
Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths (Netflix)
The Batman (Warner Bros.)
Black Adam (Warner Bros.)
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (Marvel Studios)
Devotion (Sony Pictures)
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (Marvel Studios)
Elvis (Warner Bros.)
Everything Everywhere All at Once (A24)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (Warner Bros.)
Good Night Oppy (Amazon Studios)
The Gray Man (Netflix)
Jurassic World: Dominion (Universal Pictures)
Nope (Universal Pictures)
RRR (Variance Films)
Thirteen Lives (Amazon Studios/MGM)
Thor: Love and Thunder (Marvel Studios)
Top Gun: Maverick (Paramount Pictures)
