Steven Spielberg Loves Godzilla Minus One, Watched It Three Times!

Takashi Yamazaki claims to have met God. While attending and taking part at the annual luncheon for the 96th Oscars, the director of Godzilla Minus One came face-to-face with someone who is arguably more of a giant than even Gojira, Hollywood A-list filmmaker Steven Spielberg. And to Yamazaki’s surprise and delight, Spielberg loves Godzilla Minus One, and he claims to have watched the film three times already!

Yamazaki wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter (via @nostoro), which translates to the following:

Check out Spielberg and Yamazaki’s memorable photo op below:

On Monday, February 12, this year’s Academy Award nominees came together for a luncheon to take their “class photo” at the annual event for posterity. Spielberg is nominated for Best Picture for Maestro, having served as a producer on the film along with Bradley Cooper, Fred Berner, Amy Durning and Kristie Macosko Krieger. Meanwhile, Yamazaki was nominated for Best Visual Effects for his contributions to Godzilla Minus One, along with Takashi Yamazaki, Kiyoko Shibuya, Masaki Takahashi and Tatsuji Nojima.

Godzilla Minus One Makes History

The rich and storied tradition of the Godzilla film franchise dates all the way back to 1954 — 70 years ago. What began with the brilliant, black-and-white Toho Co., Ltd. movie, Gojira, has turned into a worldwide phenomenon, boasting nearly 40 big-screen installments. But, in all that time, the King of the Monsters had never received a single Academy Award nomination. And then director and visual effects supervisor Takashi Yamazaki’s Godzilla Minus One dropped like an atomic bomb on theaters worldwide. And after the Oscar nod was revealed, Yamazaki responded in a statement (via Entertainment Weekly):

“For nearly 40 years I have been making films while admiring the artistry of Hollywood Visual Effects, and I feel that I have finally come this far. I had not set my sights on being nominated, but I am very happy to have been brought to this place… I think it is a wonderful day for Godzilla!”

While the Godzilla Minus One Oscar nomination is well-deserved, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has the unfortunate reputation for not always recognizing the visual effects achievements of Giant Monster, aka Kaiju films. For instance, the brilliant effects (technical and engineering) work done on the original King Kong (1933) was snubbed by the Academy.

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But one of the Academy’s most egregious and bone-headed blunders actually came at the expense of one of today’s biggest names in Hollywood special effects, the incomparable Rick Baker. The 1976 remake King Kong won an Oscar for Special Achievement in Visual Effects. However, the artist who worked so hard on the film, and Baker even suited up to play the giant ape in the motion picture, did not receive the Oscar for VFX. Instead, the award went to only Carlo Rambaldi, Glen Robinson and Frank Van der Veer. A disappointed Baker responded to the news in a television broadcast back in 1977 (via YouTube):

“The fact that I designed Kong and sculpted Kong, built Kong and played Kong in the picture… and the fact that I didn’t receive the credit that was virtually nothing — and that somebody else is receiving an Academy Award for that — is upsetting.”