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On January 23, 2024,Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Versewasnominated for a Best Animated Feature Film Oscar.
Be sure to alsoread our review.
Miller, for his part, was said to be MIA for much of the production.
It really does happen on every film, she says of the revisions.
If the story isnt right, you have to keep going until it is.
Stephen is an experienced artist who has worked on projects for major animation studios and streamers.
When he spoke with Vulture in early May, production onAcross the Spider-Versewas not yet complete.
As producer, Phil overrides all the directors.
They have to do what Phil says.
So there were constant changes and cuts.
With Phil Lord, nothing is ever final or approved.
Nothing was really set in stone.
Nothing was ever done.
For animated movies, the majority of the trial-and-error process happens during writing and storyboarding.
Not with fully completed animation.
The changes in the writing would go through storyboarding.
Then theres cloth and hair effects, which have to repeatedly be redone anytime theres an animation change.
And they work closely with lighting and compositing on all the color and visual treatments in this movie.
Every pass is plugged into editing.
These are a lot of artists affected by one change.
Imagine an endless stream of them.
Over 100 people left the project because they couldnt take it anymore.
Thats a lot of money.
Those people are sitting there getting paid to do nothing.
The water behind the dam kept growing because Phil was holding off sequences.
Then at a certain point, we ran out of time.
The dam broke, water came flooding in, and all the departments were swamped, doing overtime.
But that didnt stop all the changes from coming in.
There are sequences that we started in 2021 that we just finished in May.
That is a lot of artists hours and time and energy and stress.
This production has been death by a thousand paper cuts.
It is not as though Phil is unfamiliar with how animation works.
His and Chris Millers work speaks for itself.
Obviously, they are successful, and the work that they produce is good.
EvenIwas a fan of their work; I would still say that I am.
The thing is, Phil and Chris are incapable of committing to an idea.
They dont really have a clear vision.
What theyre good at is slowly and incrementally making things better through trial and error.
But Chris Miller I dont know how hands-on he is with this production.
For the most part, when we heard that a change or cut has been made, its Phil.
We always hear, Theres a Phil note.
Its never really Chris.
Chriss name didnt pop up much until the last couple of months of production.
And I do genuinely think its a good movie.
But that being said, its been debilitating for a lot of the artists involved.
The frustrating thing is at the end of the day the work is good.
Theres a lot of high praise that comes out of it.
So theres this rollercoaster of emotions where you go through hell but it makes people happy.
And it makes you happy that people are happy.
And you want to do it again.
Theyve announced thatBeyond the Spider-Versewill be released in March of next year.
Ive seen people say, Oh, they probably worked on it at the same time.
Theres no way that movies coming out then.
Theres been progress on the pre-production side of things.
Everyones been fully focused onAcross the Spider-Verseand barely crossing the finish line.
And now its like,Oh, yeah, now we have to do the other one.
And we did have time when the pipeline wasnt chockablock full.
But I got to say, from my perspective, that was a remarkable gift.
Sony representatives declined to comment on whether the thirdSpider-Versefilm will be delivered on time.
Charlie is a veteran animator.
He also spoke with Vulture beforeAcross the Spider-Versewas complete.
Animation is finishing Friday.
No animator is going to put a key down anymore.
And Phil is still rewriting stuff.
Sony has been fighting with him on this for the whole movie.
I dont know if hes delusional.
Ive worked on projects where things are rewritten even late in production.
But this is another level of craziness.
His movies work.Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballsworked pretty well.The Mitchells vs the Machineswas a success.Spider-Versewas a success.
So he thinks thats the way of doing it.
I dont know if its a sense of laziness.
You tell the artists, Come up with stuff.
Create the footage and then Ill decide which direction to go.
Its easier to do it that way.
But its very destructive and time consuming.
Because its such a cool project, people want to get their shots in.
They want to finish them and ensure its in the movie and they can keep it for their reel.
So people have been working like crazy.
The hardest thing on the animators has not been working 11 hours a day, 70 hours a week.
Thats not how it is anymore.
In every movie Ive worked on, there have been revisions.
Youre always working on a movie that is evolving.
But definitely not on this level.
For sure, there is pressure to making a sequel to the movie that won an Oscar.
And there are the difficulties of doing several universes and a lot of characters.
But thats not whats been delaying the movie and making the artists go crazy.
The biggest issue weve had is the writing.
Phil had no idea what he wanted.
Maybe he has difficulties making up his mind.
Of course, its part of every movie where the director says, What if we could dothisorthat?
And normally, its the producers role to push back.
The problem is, Phil is the producer.
He cant push back against himself.
Which is kind of a problem when youre working in 3-D animation.
In the animation industry, ask anyone hes worked with: Its his reputation.
I know a ton of people who never want to work on a project with him again.
Eliott worked on staff for Sony Pictures Imageworks at the films production base in Vancouver, Canada.
Youd be surprised how quickly people get used to chaos especially animators.
We work very long hours and work very hard to get to places like Sony and Pixar.
With this movie, Sony Pictures Animation didnt want to fall into the sequel trap.
There was a bit more trepidation.
Is it worth it?
It was like they were amping themselves up to run a marathon.
Something like 90 percent of the shots in the trailer are not in the movie.
We re-engineered or reanimated, had different characters doing the same thing.
It was purely a sequence of cool ideas they made us slap together while they rested the production.
We were idle; thats what they called it.
The worst thing you could do to an artist is hire them and then tell them to do nothing.
Each week that went by idle meant that later on it was going to be more insane.
An avalanche of work is waiting.
Its hard to go from a standstill to achieving at the top possible creative peak.
Then that affects downstream departments.
And some were brought back up toward the end.
The other person who worked on the shot would feel cheated.
Like, Hey, I did six out of those seven characters and youre calling the shot yours?
Prior toAcross the Spider-Verse, Nathan worked as an artist on several other Lord and Miller movies.
Phil and Chris have a reputation.
As producers, they used to come onto a project when it was 80 percent finished.
And this is animation that people have been working on for a long time.
Finished work, not some mock-up thing.
I heard onMitchellsthey did that.
OnSpider-Verse 1,they did that.Lego, same thing.
What that means is you have artists who feel extremely vulnerable.
Phil does have good ideas.
He speaks creatively really well, and listening to Phil can be inspiring.
But the process is not inspiring.
You get them to start putting bricks on top of each other.
And hes like, Nah, knock that part down.
Artists in this industry are generally very self-critical; they internalize feedback and want to do their best.
Their work is how they get the next job.
A movie like this is taking advantage of those people creatively.
But the workers are also vulnerable in another sense: They want to stay in Canada.
Theyre on visas from countries from which theyd ideally like to emigrate.
Aspirations to immigrate keep them tied to the studio.
Theyre underpaid, so they need the OT to pay their bills.
The relocation package doesnt cover costs.
Thats no way to live your life.
Sony spokespeople deny that the studio lowballs animators salaries.
