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When American Fiction writer and director Cord Jefferson collected his best original screenplay Oscar he used his speech to call Hollywood out.
"I understand that this is a risk-averse industry," he told the audience.
"But $200 million movies are also a risk. But you take the risk anyway. Instead of making one $200 million movie, make 20 $10 million movies. Or 50 $4 million movies."
Jefferson might have said it out loud, but the films sweeping the statuettes quietly confirmed the potential low- and mid-budget films have in an industry that won't stop pushing mega-blockbusters with enormous price tags.
Godzilla slays the competition
While mega-budget blockbusters are often locked out of the more artistically prestigious Oscar categories, one place they get a look in is visual effects: Impressive budgets frequently means slicker effects.
This year's contenders were:
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 ($378 million budget)
- Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One ($440 million budget)
- Napoleon ($302 million budget)
- The Creator ($121 million budget)
- Godzilla Minus One ($18-23 million budget)
Despite costing a fraction of its competitors, this epic Japanese-language Kaiju production took home the award, becoming the first Godzilla film to win an Oscar in the character's 70-year movie history.
Even director Takashi Yamazaki seemed surprised when he and his team — carrying tiny golden Godzillas and wearing matching Godzilla shoes — took to the stage to accept the award.
"The possibility of standing on this stage seemed out of reach, and the moment we are nominated we felt like Rocky Balboa," Yamazaki said.
"This is proof everyone has a chance."
Give the people low-finance horror films
Godzilla Minus One sees the giant lizard terrorise post-WWII Japan and has been universally praised for its larger-than-life effects, a lot of which happen on water — a notoriously tricky VFX challenge.
Not only was Godzilla Minus One critically acclaimed, it made a fair chunk of change too, recouping $161 million ($US107 million) internationally.
"There is a history of low-finance horror finding mass audiences in congested film distribution markets," explains Steve Gaunson, an associate professor in cinema studies at RMIT.
"The Blair Witch Project was shot for $US60,000 and grossed $US250 million at the box office. In Australia we had similar, albeit [on a] smaller scale, with Talk to Me grossing $US92 million from a budget of $US4 million."
Gaunson says the issue smaller films face in a blockbuster world is not so much their production budgets, but their marketing budgets — which can add upwards of $150 million to the overall cost of a film.
"Unless a film can find an audience early into its release who can build a strong social media buzz, most films will often struggle to recoup their budget," he says.
Essentially, lower budget films like Godzilla Minus One or last year's best picture winner Everything Everywhere All at Once ($38 million budget) need substantial organic support before they can even dream of reaching the exposure of one Marvel marketing budget.
Mega-blockbuster backlash
When Marvel VFX workers in the US voted to unionise late last year, it brought to light the poor treatment of employees.
"It was almost six months of overtime every day. I was working seven days a week, averaging 64 hours a week on a good week," one anonymous whistleblower told Vulture.
"Marvel genuinely works you really hard. I've had co-workers sit next to me, break down, and start crying. I've had people having anxiety attacks on the phone."
In comparison, Yamazaki told Vulture that he works hard to make sure he runs a "white" company: one that doesn't exploit their workers.
"We really try to avoid long hours but, if you do, it's a very welcoming environment in which to spend a few extra hours," he said.
"Hopefully, in due time, VFX budget increases will allow for more improvements. I am looking forward to the day when we can pay creatives more."
But nothing highlighted the disparity, between the size of blockbuster budgets compared to their quality, than the release of Dune: Part Two earlier this month.
At a production cost of $287 million ($38 million more than the first edition, thanks to pandemic-related costs) Dune: Part Two is considered towards the lower end of blockbuster budgets.
However, Denis Villeneuve's film is being lauded for its stunning special effects, especially compared to the look of recent films like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania ($416 million) with its disturbing CGI villain, or even recent Universal tentpole Argylle ($302 million) which, you know, featured this scene.
Both these films underperformed at the box office: Quantumania became one of the rare Marvel films not to break the half-a-billion mark (a flop in Marvel's eyes); Argylle brought home a paltry $142 million worldwide — half of its reported production budget.
No end to the mega-blockbuster in sight
Despite the diminishing returns on mega-budget films, Gaunson says Hollywood seems committed to staying the course.
"Ultimately, studios are now producing few films but with high productions," he says.
"Rather than produce five action movies in an iffy market, they are pooling all of their budgets into one mega film with an all-star cast."
It gets even tougher for low- and mid-budget films to break through in a smaller market like Australia, where our number of cinema screens pales in comparison to the US.
"Audiences have never had such a wide choice of films, which is causing issues for theatrical distribution. With ticket prices also at an all-time high [Australia's are some of the most expensive worldwide], audiences are cautious on spending money on a mediocre film," Gaunson says.
"Therefore theatres are tending to book out known popular and crowd-pleaser films, rather than offer a wider selection for its audiences."
For a long time, it was unclear if Godzilla Minus One would even make it to Australian cinemas. But by the film gods' grace it debuted locally in December 2023 (a month after the Japanese premiere) to a very short run in select cinemas.
As Yamazaki confirmed in his post-Oscars interview, we still don't know when or if the film will come to streaming.
But while Godzilla Minus One's Oscar victory might notch one up for the little guys, Gaunson isn't confident it will bring around industry-wide change.
"Independent films finding theatrical distribution has never been so difficult."