Latest news with #WētāFX
Forbes
10-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘A Minecraft Movie' VFX Team Talk Characters, Comedy, And Much More
Last weekend I took you behind the scenes of director Jared Hess' A Minecraft Movie, as VFX Supervisor Sheldon Stopsack and Animation Supervisor Kevin Estey talked about their ambitious work on the film. This weekend, I continue with an even deeper dive into how Wētā FX helped bring the world and characters of Minecraft to the big screen. You can read my first article about Wētā FX's work on A Minecraft Movie here, in which Stopsack and Estey discuss Wētā FX's heavy lifting to help bring the unique world of Minecraft to life, seamlessly blending the game's blocky designs with live-action filmmaking. At nearly $880 million worldwide box office and going strong, A Minecraft Movie is on course to finish as one of the year's biggest blockbusters and could even top some of the summer's top tentpoles like Fantastic Four: First Steps and Superman, depending on how many more ticket sales Minecraft can stack up as it approaches $900 million. VFX character designs for "A Minecraft Movie." Source: Wētā FX Wētā FX's detailed world-building was foundational for A Minecraft Movie. Stopsack explained, 'The question often comes up how our environments had an impact on the style and appearance of our characters. Ironically it was the other way around. Our characters had a strong influence on the environment. Particularly Malgosha and Dennis needed to create emotional connections with our cast. This was what in large part established how realistic or abstract we could go with the appearance and performance. We used this knowledge to apply to our environment to ensure that the digital character did not feel out of place." Their efforts resulted in the creation of the mindbogglingly expansive Overworld, combining 64 distinct terrains into a continuous environment for both day and night scenes. The vast digital landscape was shared with Digital Domain for the film's final battle. Stopsack highlighted the immense scale, saying, 'An interesting fun fact to illustrate the sheer scale we ended up with is our grass dressing. For the Overworld, we ended up placing more than 2 billion clumps of grass patches, comprised of individual grass blades.' VFX character designs for "A Minecraft Movie." Source: Wētā FX When I asked if there were creatures or other aspects that presented specific challenges or were particularly fun, Estey offered extensive insights about animating the distinct characters. 'Each character and creature we created has a unique story and presented its own challenge, whether big or small,' Estey noted, 'because none are the same as the next. We ended up with 26 unique characters and creatures, each needing its own distinct personality, behavior, and style of motion.' VFX work for Malgosha in "A Minecraft Movie." Source: Wētā FX Speaking about Malgosha, Estey remarked, "Malgosha was particularly unique as she didn't exist in the game but was a critical antagonist in the film. We were walking a fine line of introducing a new character to a community that knows the game, yet we had to ensure she still fit into the universe and would be accepted. Jared wanted all the characters in The Nether to look and feel as realistic and tangible as possible, yet still maintain an iconic blocky aesthetic so they could exist believably on screen alongside the actors." To achieve the right balance, Malgosha was given a fleshy, detailed appearance with jiggly jowls and a flowing cloak, but maintained a distinctive blockiness, combining realism with the iconic Minecraft look. He also noted a particularly fun part of the process involved some great physical comedy: "One of the most memorable scenes to work on from an animation and performance standpoint was the showdown between Steve and Malgosha, particularly the triple-knife gag. When I first read the script, I was immediately drawn to the ridiculous gimmick where Malgosha repeatedly tries to stab Steve with knives she insists she doesn't have. It was such an absurd yet hilarious concept that I couldn't wait to see how it would play out." VFX character designs for "A Minecraft Movie." Source: Wētā FX Creating Malgosha involved significant collaborative efforts, with motion-capture performer Allan Henry providing the physical performance and vocal inspiration. His humorous interactions with Jack Black, who portrayed Steve, significantly influenced Malgosha's animation. 'I've known Allan for almost 15 years," Estey started. "We've done endless motion capture sessions together since the early days of the first Hobbit films. Not only is he an incredible stunt performer and actor, but he's also one of the funniest people I've ever met. We're constantly cracking each other up on set, even though we do have to remind ourselves that we're there to get work done. You can imagine my excitement when I thought of the humor Allan would bring to this scene. Then, of course, there's Jack Black, someone I've been a massive fan of (I've even been known to belt out an occasional karaoke rendition of 'Tribute' or 'Wonderboy')." FEATURED | Frase ByForbes™ Unscramble The Anagram To Reveal The Phrase Pinpoint By Linkedin Guess The Category Queens By Linkedin Crown Each Region Crossclimb By Linkedin Unlock A Trivia Ladder He continued, 'To see Jack Black and Allan Henry — two people I hold in the highest regard for their comedic talent — bring this [triple-knife attack] scene to life on set was unforgettable. They ad-libbed plenty of new lines and had the entire crew in stitches with their performance. The two of them even came up with the idea for Malgosha to add the line, 'sneak attaaackk…,' on her final throw as she keeled over onto her face (Allan's physical humor knows no bounds). Jared would run the entire scene for each take to give them freedom to explore the humor, and at the end of every take, when Allan would be face-planted with his bum in the air and Jared would yell 'cut,' almost the entire crew of 100 people would burst out laughing. This happened on every take.' Estey recalled, 'Realizing the humor had been elevated beyond the script by these two comedians placed a great responsibility on us in animation—to make sure that the humor carried through to Malgosha's digital performance without anything getting lost in translation. When Rachel House then provided her vocal performance, we folded that into what Allan had established on set with Jack, along with what our animation department had developed for her unique style of motion and behavior.' 'Seeing the final scene come together and hearing people laugh and talk about its hilarity during screenings was an incredible payoff," Estey concluded. 'That kind of validation, where something you loved working on connects with the audience, is incredibly gratifying. For me, this was one of the most thrilling and satisfying scenes of the film to tackle." A Minecraft Movie is of course full of many more characters and creatures, from Dennis himself to the Piglins and Bee, and I'll continue speaking with Wētā FX when I review the home entertainment release of A Minecraft Movie – that's coming up, so stay tuned and check back soon!
Forbes
04-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
See ‘The Minecraft Movie' Best Characters Through The Eyes Of Wētā FX
A Minecraft Movie from director Jared Hess is on a roll at the box-office and on its way to being one the biggest blockbusters of 2025. Wētā FX gave me a behind-the-scenes look at their work on the film, including what makes some characters or creatures their personal favorites. Character effects for Malgosha, voiced by Rachel House in "A Minecraft Movie." To catch up briefly, after its fourth weekend added an impressive $60 million worldwide, A Minecraft Movie has captured enough audience imagination and love to make it a contender for the year's top spots on the box office charts, with a $900+ million finish looking very possible now. Much contributed to A Minecraft Movie's enormous success, including obviously the fact Minecraft is the best-selling video game in history, the time and patience that went into writing and developing the film project to make sure it was done right, and of course the talented cast and crew who elevated the entire proceedings. But no doubt, the success of the film depended heavily on its acceptance as having faithfully and accurately adapted the world of Minecraft, but in a way faithful to the game but also faithful to what will attract mainstream movie audiences who haven't played the game. And doing that meant interpreting the block-based world of Minecraft perfectly, threading a needle to make everybody happy. Who do you call in such a moment? You call Wētā FX. FEATURED | Frase ByForbes™ Unscramble The Anagram To Reveal The Phrase Pinpoint By Linkedin Guess The Category Queens By Linkedin Crown Each Region Crossclimb By Linkedin Unlock A Trivia Ladder Some background: Wētā FX handled major visual effects in A Minecraft Movie. VFX Supervisors Sheldon Stopsack and Simon Jung, animation Supervisor Kevin Estey, and the rest of their Wētā team completed a total of 456 shots for the film, blending classic block-based Minecraft style locations and creatures with live-action footage. I had the opportunity to ask Stopsack and Estey some questions about their work on A Minecraft Movie, and I'm including those discussions here and in another article later this week continuing our look at Minecraft's success, the role of VFX in helping create that success, and Wētā FX's probable Oscar nomination for their work on the film. One brilliant aspect of Wētā's work that's an organic extension of the Minecraft world itself: the team developed a new technology called 'Blokz' in Houdini, specifically designed to convert standard geometry into Minecraft-style blockified shapes. Wētā designed and developed the expansive Overworld environment in A Minecraft Movie as well, featuring 64 different terrains and all sorts of environments integrated into the continuous cinematic world. The final big battle sequence effects work by Digital Domain used Wētā's environment assets as well. 'Minecraft was certainly unique and not the 'ordinary' visual effects movie you would typically expect to work on,' Stopsack said. 'This is mostly attributed to the underlying key question we had to ask ourselves, how do we combine and honor the well-established aesthetic of the world's most popular video game with live-action sets and performers?' Stopsack continued, 'Since none of us had a clear answer to this question at the start, we started off with something that was fairly true to the game. Our Models team prototypes a toolset that would become known as the BLOKZ Tool. This method allowed us to turn geometry into a pointcloud. Each point would then be replaced with individual cubes. We ended up creating a fairly extensive inventory of different block types inspired by common material types you find in the game.' With such innovative tech, Wētā's team was able to create a library consisting of a wide variety of different Minecraft game biomes. 'All of this,' Stopsack explained, 'initially resulted in pretty abstract and very blocky assets... Our Teams explored adjustments along the lines of playing with scale, size, material distribution, jitter, erosion and so on… creating large scale assets that even at distance provided a pleasant block-like aesthetic.' Blocks in hand, Wētā's approach took a more nuanced approach as well. 'But it also introduced a more natural organic quality with imperfections and increased complexity that you would observe in the real world,' Stopsack added. The work had to transpire concurrently with the live-action production, to ensure seamless blending of visuals. 'All of this happened alongside the making of practical set builds,' Stopsack noted. 'We wanted all of our environments to be grounded in what you would find in the game. Our Pre-Production Team spent a lot of time scouting for different Biomes… If you pay close attention [when the cast arrive in the Overworld], you will recognise Badlands, Grasslands, Snowy Mountains and other Biomes inspired by Game itself.' One standout creation for A Minecraft Movie was the villain Malgosha, whose detailed textures and distinctive cloak, Wētā explains, were carefully crafted to translate Rachel House's live-action performance into the character. Malgosha and her Piglin henchmen live in a cavernous land called the Nether, for the uninitiated. Estey said of Malgosha, '[She] was by far the most involved character we created for the film, and she was the product of the skilled input from a huge team of talented people, both within Weta FX and from outside, who helped bring her to life." He added, "The initial idea Jared [Hess] had was for a villain somewhere between the crotchety, motherly villain Mama Fratelli from The Goonies, a wretch like Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars, with a creepiness like the Skeksis from The Dark Crystal.' Malgosha's design held special resonance for Estey, it turns out. 'Those three references are very close to my heart,' he explained. 'As a kid, I was enamored by the magic of '80s fantasy films and dreamed of being a filmmaker. During our early conversations, I discovered that [the director] Jared and I were born in the U.S. in the same year, and our shared love for those movies gave us a fundamental understanding of each other.' For Estey, the shared background gave him clearer insights into the filmmaker's vision of the film and its main villain. 'Our art department explored many variations based on Jared's brief," Estey said, "before we landed on a design that struck a great balance: creepy, macabre, yet silly—and, of course, blocky.' Stopsack added, 'From a VFX professional point of view, it's easy to say Malgosha was the most challenging, but also rewarding, character to work on. Finding her personality was a long journey that required us to interpret and combine a wide range of facets and input from people involved." Pointing to Estey's examples of past film influences, Stopsack said, 'Our Art Department took the lead on her character design… With her signature of a refrigerator-sized hunchback, her oversized cloak played a key role in her appearance.' After the costumers designed a practical cloak to be wornduring performances, it turned out too heavy for regular use, but still provided a perfect reference for Wētā's team. 'Numerous motion studies and explorations were undertaken before principal photography took place,' Stopsack contined, 'It was only then when she really came to life. With Allen Henry acting as her proxy on set and during our Motion Capture session, we really saw the tone of her and who she ultimately wanted to be.' Pairing Henry's performance and House's 'required us to carefully combine these various inputs and forge in to a convincing and compelling single performance and character,' he finished. This week, I'll have a continued deep-dive into A Minecraft Movie's world and how much audiences are responding to it in my follow-up about Wētā's work, including much more about the characters, the hard work integrating VFX into the live-action, and a lot of the fun the team had with certain characters – including getting their own families involved. So be sure to check back soon for that coverage, and if you're fan don't miss my home release review for Minecraft, with additional behind-the-scenes looks. A Minecraft Movie should top $900 million by the end of its run. When it does, and when it's among the finalists for the top grossing films of 2025, it will be in big part due to the tremendous visual effects work done by Wētā FX.
Forbes
02-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘The Minecraft Movie' Tops $825 Million As Biggest Blockbuster Of 2025
The Minecraft Movie tops $825 million heading into the weekend, building on its huge lead as 2025's biggest blockbuster ahead of summer movie season. Jack Black stars in "The Minecraft Movie." With a fourth weekend worldwide gross north of $60 million, including about $38 million internationally and nearly $23 million domestic, Minecraft is eyeing a fifth weekend global haul of $25-30 million and a running total likely north of $850 million. The Minecraft Movie enjoyed much early fanfare and even some cultural controversy over audience-participation trends making a mess of screening rooms, sneaking live animals into theaters, and generally acting like attendees of a Rocky Horror Picture Show cult-classic screening. But since that rowdy early period, things seem to have calmed quickly and considerably, with Minecraft quickly losing headlines to Sinners' upset opening weekend victory and continued huge weekend grosses in a packed second weekend. Indeed, Sinners deserves all of the attention it's getting and more, as does Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith for its own surprise second-place finish last weekend, and The Accountant 2 for delivering at the higher end of estimates despite the rest of the top-tier weekend box office performers all enjoying stronger than expected showings. However, The Minecraft Movie's quieter presence in the weekend headlines doesn't mean it's lost a step at the box office. Holding steady at #5 after a month into release, with such an impressive fourth-weekend cume, speaks volumes about Minecraft's brand popularity, Warner's marketing of the film, and the work that went into making it more than simply a cheap cash-in on a brand name. A huge part of the film's success is due to the way the Wētā FX team – including VFX Supervisor Sheldon Stopsack and Animation Supervisor Kevin Estey – adapted the world of the game and its characters faithfully yet in a way that translates well into a feature film alongside live-action performances and sets. Estey explained, 'Regardless of their individuality, one challenge remained constant: to balance the stylized world of Minecraft with a realistic approach that could be convincing when introducing human actors into the world. Everything had to be real enough to be believed, but not so real that it lost connection with the aesthetic game. This was always on our mind and guided us throughout production.' That can be a tough balance, keeping fans of the game and mainstream audiences all happy. Part of that balance includes tone and pacing, which I feel work strongly in The Minecraft Movie's favor as another example of both the game and film sharing a core element that drives popularity. Stopsack points to this as a significant reason the film works, telling me, 'To me, the sheep represents everything this movie stands for. It's goofy, fun, and innocent, not taking itself too seriously. Yet, it is incredibly well-thought-out and carefully crafted. A large portion of this movie's success is due to the particular and smart humour that Jared brought to it. For me, the sheep embodies all of that.' I've got a series of articles coming up full of details about Wētā's work on The Minecraft Movie, so be sure to watch for that this weekend and next week. The combination of factors are strong enough, in fact, that as an aside I can't help wondering what would've happened if Warner made a swap and Superman opened in early-April while The Minecraft Movie took the July 11th date instead. Might Superman have stood a better chance of breakout success without as much like-minded competition, while Minecraft still offered a stand-out viewing experience and all of the same powerful base of support and built-in fandom. Nevertheless, Minecraft is dominating the spring release frame easily and should manage to hold well next weekend when Thunderbolts* kicks off the summer movie season with a probable $80 million domestic bow and north of $100 million overseas, for what I expect could be a $200 million worldwide MCU opening if audience word-of-mouth is as positive as critical reviews. I suspect The Minecraft Movie will hold onto its lead as 2025's highest-grossing film until Jurassic World: Rebirth has been out a couple of weeks or so. As I explained in my summer movie analysis and predictions, there are only a few other summer filmscapable of challenging Minecraft's and Rebirth's likely eventual totals. If those films – Fantastic Four: First Steps and maybe Superman or Thunderbolts* – play where I expect, lower than $1 billion and closer to $900 million or less, then The Minecraft Movie should keep its 2025 second-place ranking all the way through holiday season in December. The Minecraft Movie put together a fun, funny, exciting family experience that could beat my bullish expectations and top $900 million by the end of its run. Summer has arrived and kids are out of school, and as we all know, if you build it they will come.
Forbes
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘Sinners' Expands Into IMAX 70mm For Extended Summer Run
Writer-director Ryan Coogler's original box office hit Sinners will expand into IMAX 70mm starting May 15th in select domestic theaters for an extended summer run. Michael B. Jordan stars in dual roles in "Sinners." After a stunning second weekend drop of less than 5% domestic and worth $45.7 million, Sinners looks to top $230 million by the end of the weekend worldwide even while Marvel Studios gets summer movie season started with Thunderbolts*. That's without the IMAX expansion, mind you, so expect to see Sinners exert real staying power into the first month of summer with this return to premium screens. At this rate, Sinners looks to be on course for a roughly $290 million final gross, plus or minus anywhere from a few million to maybe $20 million, depending a lot on how other films' perform and how much the IMAX revival packs in viewers. So far, all signs suggest audiences are loving the film, as fans and critics can't stop talking about it – relevance and resonance go a long way, studios. Pay attention. Michael B. Jordan is flexing his box office muscles and stamina, as is Coogler – so much so that Coogler made history with his deal as creator, to regain ownership of the film in 25 years. That's something that will not only obviously be of enormous value to him as an artist and businessman, but of endless value to so many future filmmakers as well. At the lower end of outcomes for the weekend, I believe Sinners is positioned to still finish with an impressive $225 million in worldwide receipts by close of business Sunday. On the higher end, $235-240 million could be in the box office cards through Sunday, depending on how well the rest of the top box office contenders shake out. Thunderbolts* will easily win the first weekend of May and summer, both domestically and internationally, so a lot depends on whether the new MCU franchise plays at the higher end, middle, or low end of expectations. The Minecraft Movie should remain in the top-five for the weekend, as it continues building toward a possible $900 cume around the world. (Be sure to watch for my Minecraft coverage this weekend, including its box office and a detailed look at Wētā FX's work on the film.) A relevant question is, will The Accountant 2 hold strong among action audiences in the face of Marvel's latest release? If so how much do those two cut into Sinners' audience? Will we see a repeat of April's end, when there was so much audience enthusiasm to go around? I think Sinners will finish with at least $230 million this weekend, on its way to a final worldwide gross of somewhere right around $300 million, or close to it on one side or the other. High-end, call it $310 million. Low-end probably sits around $265 million and presumes more typical weekly declines from this point forward. Again, much will depend on how the rest of the early-summer slate in May performs, so check out my summer movie season preview and box office predictions here. As a side note – with both Coogler's and Jordan's already-bright star wattage shining super-bright now, I can't help wondering if someone at Marvel is already thinking about multiverse possibilities that could see Killmonger as the one who grew up to take on the Black Panther mantle and rule Wakanda in some alternate reality that intersects the MCU. It would undoubtably take a lot of consideration and care to pull something like that off and honor Chadwick Boseman's brilliant performance and historic Black Panther film, as well as the themes and work and journey in the beautiful sequel Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. If anyone can do it, however, it's the team who gave us the first film and then found a way to live up to that legacy and loss with the second film. Then again, if you can make original franchises like Sinners and get good creator-control deals, there's plenty of reason to decline a return to superhero cinema in favor of creating your own personal blockbusters. And with Black Panther already set up to move forward in a new direction, we'd probably all much rather see Coogler and Jordan team up again for more totally new and different projects – or a sequel to Sinners.
Yahoo
01-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
James Cameron Worries ‘America Doesn't Stand for Anything' Under Trump and Is Working Toward New Zealand Citizenship
Having been born in Canada, James Cameron may not have had much stock in America to begin with, but nowadays, he's ready to turn his back on it completely. While giving a recent interview with New Zealand podcast 'The F#$%ING News,' Cameron shared that he's currently working toward citizenship in that country, as he spends most of his time there working on his 'Avatar' series with Wētā FX, which is located in the city of Wellington. 'It's imminent,' Cameron said of his naturalization. 'I've already qualified in terms of timing in the country, I've put in my application — I'm told it's imminent.' More from IndieWire Kate Hudson Thinks the Role of the Critic 'Has Changed' Since Her Early Rom-Com Days Why Doesn't Hollywood Produce Actors Like Gene Hackman Anymore? Prior to 2020, Cameron split his time between Malibu, California and NZ, but has worked toward the latter being his family's permanent home over the last few years. In terms of why Cameron feels ready to officially become a Kiwi, it's in no small part due to the rising tide of fascism present in America today. 'I see a turn away from everything decent,' Cameron said. 'America doesn't stand for anything if it doesn't stand for what it has historically stood for. It becomes a hollow idea, and I think they're hollowing it out as fast as they can for their own benefit.' While he doesn't think moving to New Zealand will make him 'any safer' necessarily, he does appreciate being in a country that isn't constantly inundated with the 'sickening' news brought on by Donald Trump. 'There's something nice about the New Zealand outlets — at least they'll put it on page three,' said Cameron. 'I just don't want to see that guy's face any more on the front page of the paper. It's inescapable there, it's like watching a car crash over and over and over.' As a celebrity and near-billionaire, many might think Cameron has a leg up in terms of seeking out this citizenship, but he doesn't see it that way. In fact, because his work takes him all over the world, the process of staying in New Zealand long enough to meet certain quotas was a big 'sacrifice' for him. 'You can imagine in my kind of work, it's global work,' Cameron told 'The F#$%ing News.' 'I'm everywhere for marketing and we've got people working in LA, and I've had to limit my travel and focus on [my citizenship in New Zealand]. And my wife's going through the the same thing, she's only a few months behind me.' Pointing also to the work he's done to establish himself and his business in the country, Cameron added, 'It means a lot to us because I think if you're going to uproot your family and you're going to move somewhere, you have to invest. You have to to be part of it. You have to earn standing and I've tried to do that since I've been here even as a resident, to give back through our attempts to run apprenticeship programs and things like that on our productions.' Watch Cameron's full interview on 'The F#$%ing News' below. Best of IndieWire Guillermo del Toro's Favorite Movies: 56 Films the Director Wants You to See 'Song of the South': 14 Things to Know About Disney's Most Controversial Movie The 55 Best LGBTQ Movies and TV Shows Streaming on Netflix Right Now
