"Avengers: Infinity War," which is predicted to win the Oscar for Best Visual Effects, swept the Visual Effects Society Awards on Feb. 5. Among its four wins was one in the VES equivalent of the Best Picture race -- visual effects in a feature motion picture. It prevailed over three of its four Oscar rivals -- “Christopher Robin,”“Ready Player One,” “Solo: A Star Wars Story” -- plus “Welcome to Marwen."
The fifth Oscar nominee, "First Man," won best supporting visual effects over “12 Strong,” “Bird Box,” “Bohemian Rhapsody" and “Outlaw King.”
And “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" claimed best visual effects in an animated feature over "The Grinch," ““Incredibles 2,” “Isle of Dogs” and “Ralph Breaks the Internet.”
On the TV side, "Lost in Space" took four awards while "Jack Ryan” earned one.
In the 16-year history of the VES Awards, the winner of Best Visual Effects in a Feature Motion Picture has gone on to repeat at the Oscars 10 times, including in 2017 when "The Jungle Book" won both. Last year, the groups diverged with the VES rewarding "'War for the Planet of the Apes" while the academy went with "Blade Runner 2049." They had also disagreed when it came to the first two films in the "Planet of the Apes" franchise. In 2011, the VES embraced “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” but the Oscar went to "Hugo." Likewise, in 2014 “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" won over the society but it was "Interstellar" that took home the Academy Award.
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Winners in 24 categories were selected by VES members via events hosted by 10 ten sections, including Australia, Bay Area, London, Los Angeles, Montreal, New York, Toronto and Vancouver. During the ceremony at the Beverly Hilton, the Visionary Award was presented to “Westworld” creator Jonathan Nolan while “Game of Thrones” multi-hyphenates David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were feted with the Award for Creative Excellence.
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