An important part of movies, especially action flicks, blockbuster epics, and crime thrillers, is the stunts, and that’s why the Oscars have come up with a new ‘Stunt Design’ category. Many things must be considered when filming stunts. It takes a team, sometimes of several dozen people, to design, film, perform, and ultimately edit the stunts and the action sequences. In the past 20 years, we’ve seen assistance with computer-generated imaging, or CGI, but there is still a lot of human work that is involved in performing stunts.
Stunt Design: A New Oscar Category in the Works
If you watch the Academy Awards, then you know. Besides the most well-known categories of best film, best actor/actress, supporting actor/actress, there are several dozen categories. Unfortunately, stunt design has never been a category. That’s about to change soon.
Over the past few years, a few actors and crew have been advocates for including stunt design as a category in the Oscars. Movies like Once Upon a Time in Hollywood shone the spotlight on stunt performers. The Tarantino movie featured the relationship between two men: the actor and his stuntman.
The Science of Stunt Work and Design
It can take weeks, months, or even years to plan stunts. Multiple factors must be addressed, including but not limited to safety, measuring length and/or height, depths of scenery, weather conditions, just to name a few. The most important aspect is the safety of the stunt performer. Oftentimes times engineers are brought in to consult.
The team of engineers, set designers, and the safety crew all must check in with each other even before the stunt performer is added to the scene. For sequences like a car crash, a chase, a fire, a high fall, a rapid water “drowning,” or a fight scene, which may last under a minute, know that it likely took months of preparation.
The Stunt Design Academy Award
It looks a though the Stunt Design category is a go and will be added to the 100th anniversary of the Academy Awards. It will be called Achievement in Stunt Design. The exact specifics and qualifications are being determined by the Academy’s Production and Technology Branch.
So, who could be considered for the Stunt Design Oscar? There are plenty of actors who often do their own stunts, like Jackie Chan, Tom Cruise, Gina Carano, and even a young Chloë Grace Moretz in Kick-Ass. However, it’s most likely the award will be given for team effort, like the creation, the conceptualization, and the design, among other considerations. We can’t wait to see how the Stunt Design Award plays out!
