Weta wizards compete for more Oscars

Weta Workshop's Richard Taylor is in line for yet another Oscar tomorrow.

New Zealand's Weta special-effects wizards are in contention for more Oscars in tomorrow's 78th Academy Awards in Los Angeles.

But four-time Oscar winner and Weta Workshop chief Richard Taylor, who flew to Los Angeles on Friday, says King Kong's Naomi Watts also deserved a nomination for best actress.

And he hopes that actors who play digital characters will one day be recognised in best actor categories.

Watts played heroine Ann Darrow opposite the digitally-created gorilla played by actor Andy Serkis, who was Gollum in The Lord Of The Rings triology.

Peter Jackson's US$207 million ($315.21 million) blockbuster of King Kong has five Oscar nominations for best achievement in makeup, art direction, achievement in sound editing, sound mixing and visual effects.

"Naomi made the most staggering performance," Taylor told NZPA.

"Weta have created the first digital character that made an audience cry and that is an achievement.

"That pales compared to Naomi's performance opposite a digital character that made the audience cry.

"That is the sign of a truely phenomenal actress."

Digital characters were a new creation, but worthy of recognition.

"It's such a radically new way of thinking and the academy is forward thinking yet it is a traditional ceremony, but I believe recognition will come with time because we are going to see more of this," Taylor said.

The results of the 5800 voters of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will be screened to a television audience of hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

Fantasy movies have been overlooked this year for best picture, in favour of gritty, realistic dramas and those with political angles.

Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, which was largely shot in New Zealand, and directed by Andrew Adamson, has been nominated for sound mixing, make-up and visual effects -- the latter two are also nominations for Weta.

King Kong, set in New York and on an imaginary sub-tropical island, was made entirely in Wellington.

In 2004 Peter Jackson's The Lord Of The Rings: Return of the King blitzed the Oscars with 11 awards, including best picture.

Taylor said despite King Kong's international box office success, it seemed to be placed in a kind of pop culture environment rather than recognised for its artistic achievement.

"I don't think it was deserving of that, it's a far more solid and worthy film than that. One day it will be recognised as a classic."

Narnia won a Bafta -- the British equivalent of an Oscar -- in London last month.

Taylor and Weta Digital boss Joe Letteri also won a Bafta for special visual effects for King Kong.

Baftas are seen as a forecast for Oscar winners.

- NZPA