Best Visual Effects Oscar Winners

Cute, except they didn't even use the original footage! In the ET clip, they used the Drew Barrymore cleaned up version with walkie talkies instead of guns.

Looking back at the winners is interesting, but as in the case of all award contests, hindsight can be a cruel magnifying glass to examine what was considered the "Best."

There is little doubt that "Gravity" will take home the award for 2013, since, as in the case of "The Life of Pi," the movie would be virtually unfeasible (at least with the directorial approach it takes) without elaborate visual effects. It is also the latest and most extreme example of the movie that is virtually all visual effects (though perhaps there are a few cuts that don't include CGI, I'm sure even those have been digitally massaged, which is in a way yet a less obvious kind of visual effect).

I still think it's a little early to know which of these will be considered classics and bear repeated watching in the grand scheme. The original "King Kong" and "Jason and the Argonauts" were films which were only made possible thanks to visual effects, but it is interesting to hear how condescending many fans are today when talking about these films. Who knows but when 15 years from now, and movies are an immersive and interactive experience, that you won't hear fans talking about how "Avatar" and "Lord of the Rings" were "OK for their time," as if they were talking about certain primitive artifacts from the Paleolithic era.

Super cool -- the cruel tragedy is the clip of the never-seen real ending of Golden Compass that they didn't have the courage to show in theaters. As a fan of those books, always bummed that the trilogy ended at one film.

Gotta love three straight years of LOTR. Such fantastic work.

This whole reel should just be Polar Express.