Should Andy Serkis get an Oscar nomination for his motion capture performances?

With Andy Serkis reprising his role as Caesar in the hugely anticipated War for the Planet of the Apes, in theatres this weekend, talk has once again surfaced suggesting that Serkis should be nominated for an Oscar for his performance. Of course, I will have to wait till I see War for the Planet of the Apes to form an opinion on that particular performance, but his numerous brilliant motion capture performances of the past can certainly be analysed. Although there have been other actors who have produced other really good motion capture performances, such as Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk and Zoe Saldana in Avatar (2009), Serkis is seen as the godfather of this particular kind of acting, being one of the leading reasons it has become as advanced as it has today. Talk for Serkis to be nominated first began with his role as Gollum in the ‘Lord of the Rings’ films, then to a slightly lesser degree for his role as King Kong. It happened again when he first played Caesar in 2011’s Rise of the Planet of the Apes, and then the loudest noises for Serkis’ exceptional and pioneering work for motion capture to be recognised came in 2014’s summer sequel Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Although Koba was also brilliant in this film, Caesar was certainly the standout. Serkis has said that his work deserves to be judged on a level playing field to all other actors, as motion capture work has reached such a level of quality and sophistication. The technology is truly amazing and the general public have generally been wowed by just how much he brings these characters to life, but some have had trouble accepting it as acting, despite the great visuals.

Admittedly, it is very difficult to know just how much credit is owed to the animators, and which expressions or movements come purely from the actor, and which are just simply added in post-production. However, despite this, what Serkis does has been well documented and I definitely think that his extensive movements, expressions, voices etc are certainly facets of acting, and that he certainly does enough to be allowed to be considered for an Oscar, if the performance is good enough. Also, it can be argued that every Oscar nominated/ Oscar winning performance is down to a team of people, not just the individual. Some of this brilliant performance is surely somewhat down to the writing, the direction etc, and not just the singular actors performance. Because of these reasons, I think that motion capture performances should definitely be considered for Oscars, despite not being traditional acting performances. However, I do of course think that were there to be a motion capture performance nominated for an Oscar, it would have to genuinely be one of the top few performances from that year, and cannot just be awarded because motion capture acting has not been nominated before.

With the ‘Planet of the Apes’ franchise set to reach greater dramatic heights than ever with the new film, there is a good chance that Serkis’ third performance as Caesar could be his best yet, but this of course remains to be seen. But if his performance is as great as we are hoping it will be, I do think that Serkis should be able to be finally nominated for an Oscar for his performance, if it truly is one of the best of the year, and motion capture performances should be judged on a level playing field, it is just a matter of how good the performance and how great the character created is.