‘Oppenheimer’ omits the majority of its VFX crew from the credits
Christopher Nolan’s new epic Oppenheimer, which tells the story of the father of the atomic bomb, has been accused of not crediting the majority of the visual effects crew who worked on the movie.
Telling the story of the tumultuous life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the film stars the likes of Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh and Matt Damon, and has been celebrated for its spectacular visual style. Previously celebrating the fact that his film had no CGI shots, this suggested that there were no digital special effects in the movie at all, a statement about the film which is false.
Whilst it’s true that there is no computer-generated imagery (CGI) in the movie, visual effects will have been used to digitally alter several images through the use of compositing.
In the case of Oppenheimer, it was the British visual design company DNEG who helped bring the movie to life, yet it has come to light that the majority of the effects crew were not credited for their work. Only 26 names have been listed in the film’s credits, yet it is thought that this number should have been around 125.
Commenting on the issue, Filmmaker & VFX Supervisor Hugo Guerra took to Twitter to state: “And there you have it, Oppenheimer has a VFX crew of 27 people from DNEG (including the overall VFX Sup). It looks like it’s only compositing and no CG. Congratulations to the team. The film looks amazing. Won’t spoil or review it now. I will wait a bit longer to do that”.
Nolan’s movie held its premiere shortly before the SAG-AFTRA strike was announced, with thousands of actors taking to the picket line alongside the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA), in a fight for fair pay.
Take a look at the tweet from Guerra below.
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