Andy Serkis is one of Hollywood’s finest go-to actors for playing motion-capture roles in films. He played Caesar in the Planet of the Apes trilogy, Gollum in The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit films, and the titular character in 2005’s King Kong. However, many fans wouldn’t be aware of his role as a Performance Capture Consultant in Gareth Edwards’ 2014 kaiju film, Godzilla. Serkis explained that it was not a full-on acting role like his other monster roles.
Beyond acting, Serkis has also tried his hands at filmmaking. He served as the director of Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle in which he also did mo-cap for the role of Baloo. He is also the director of Tom Hardy’s Venom: Let There Be Carnage. He will soon helm the LOTR film, The Hunt for Gollum.
Andy Serkis Deserves An Oscar For His Contribution To Godzilla and The Monsterverse
Andy Serkis can be considered one of the pioneers in acting with motion sensors on his body. His experience in the field prompted him to start his own London-based mo-cap studio called Imaginarium. Serkis provided his expertise for the American version of the Japanese kaiju monster Godzilla in the 2014 film of the same name.
According to IMDb, the Black Panther actor is credited as Performance Capture Consultant in Godzilla. When he graced the venue of WonderCon in 2014, he explained his role to IGN in an interview. He revealed that his studio Imaginarium was consulted for the project after the filming had commenced.
Serkis explained that, unlike his other films where he played the monster, he had a limited but crucial role in depicting the kaiju monster. He revealed that he did not have to play the character all the way through but he was tasked with bringing emotional quality to the performance of the monster. He shared with IGN:
It was a very different situation [than] making ‘Apes’ or something, where I’m playing the character all the way through. But as a consultancy, we worked on the project to see if we could bring some emotional quality to the performance. It’s understanding where that character comes from, the ancient soul awakening from the deep to come back. He basically comes back to try and restore balance to the world.
In a profile for the BBC, director Gareth Edwards further explained what Serkis’s involvement meant for the film. He revealed that Serkis’ role was to help “shape the title character’s emotional arc.” Serkis mostly worked on the facial expressions of the monster, something he was an expert on after starring in numerous such roles. Serkis’ movements were used only in a couple of places in the film.
While Performance Capture Consultant is not a largely recognizable category, Andy Serkis surely deserves an honorary Oscar for his contributions to Mo-cap. His role in Godzilla may have influenced the success of further films in the Monsterverse, as audiences grew emotionally connected to these monsters.
Fantastic Four Star Jamie Bell Praised Andy Serkis’ Involvement In Such Mo-Cap Roles
Jamie Bell played The Thing in 2015’s Fantastic Four and drew inspiration from Andy Serkis’ mo-cap performances over the years. He had worked together with Serkis in King Kong and The Adventures of Tintin. He saw how the Star Wars actor harnessed the technology and created lasting characters for his films.
He told Robert Pattinson during an interview for Interview Magazine about how Serkis made Gollum a piece of cinematic history. He shared that the actor truly immerses himself in the mo-cap characters that he played. Bell shared with the Interview Magazine:
I’ve worked with Andy a bunch since we did Tintin together, so I’ve seen how he’s really harnessed this technology and used it to his advantage to create these lasting characters. I mean, I would consider Gollum to be a piece of cinematic history in popular culture, the same way Star Wars characters are. After my experience of seeing him work on Tintin and King Kong, I really saw how he could immerse himself in these characters.
Serkis’s involvement was a big plus for Godzilla, which was praised for its direction and visual effects. The film earned $529 million at the box office (via The Numbers). Godzilla is now available for streaming on Netflix and Max.
