' Ex Machina' New sci-fi movie that wins the Academy Award for Visual Effects and updates the possibilities of independent films

"Ex Machina" synopsis

Caleb, who works as a programmer at Blue Book, which operates the world's No. 1 search engine, lives in a mansion in the middle of nature owned by CEO Nathan, who has amassed a huge amount of wealth but rarely appears. , get a Being There to stay for a week. Caleb arrives at a remote location. What awaited him was an interesting and mysterious experiment in which he had to cooperate with the ``Turing test'' of the artificial intelligence (AI) installed in the beautiful female robot ``Eva'' that Nathan secretly developed...・.

Index

• Lowest production cost ever for a visual effects award-winning film
• A new science fiction movie created by the relationship of trust between producer and director.
• Discover amazing locations that enhance your concept
• Director of photography's commitment
  
• Whitehurst overcame difficulties

Lowest production cost ever for a visual effects award-winning film

Ex Machina, produced in the UK in 2015, won the Best Visual Effects Award at the 88th Academy Awards the following year. Unfortunately, it was only nominated for the screenplay award, but Alicia Vikander, who starred in this film, won the supporting actress award for `` All About Lily '' (15), and although it is a small work, it has a strong presence. Ta.

There is data that is easy to understand. The following five films were nominated for the Visual Effects Award.

“ Star Wars: The Force Awakens ”: $245 million (approximately 26.8 billion yen)

“ Mad Max: Fury Road ”: $150,000,000 (approximately 16.4 billion yen)

“ The Revenant ”: $135,000,000 (approximately 14.7 billion yen)

“ The Martian ”: $108,000,000 (approximately 11.8 billion yen)

“Ex Machina”: $15,000,000 (approximately 1.6 billion yen)

Have you noticed? This is a list arranged in order of production costs, but among the many great titles, this one at the end is different. Moreover, it was said to have the lowest production cost for an award-winning film in the history of the category (for reference, the production cost of the Japanese movie Shin Godzilla (16) is said to be approximately 1.5 billion yen. ). Winning a visual effects award on an indie-budget scale in the Western film industry is undoubtedly a remarkable feat.

“Ex Machina” trailer

This is because VFX (special effects), typified by CG, usually requires a large number of staff to work on it, which naturally leads to high costs. Although the cost of environmental improvements such as CG software has come down slightly compared to before, personnel costs are the most difficult to adjust. I want to improve the quality and need a long time, but that would increase labor costs.

Andrew Whitehurst, head of the VFX team, made a memorable comment at the award ceremony: ``Visual effects require more teamwork than other departments, so this is a great achievement for everyone.'' When we looked into the production process, we found that collaboration not only within the CG team but also beyond the production department produced quality, and produced a wonderful work that did not feel constrained by the low budget.

A new science fiction movie created by the relationship of trust between producer and director.