Oscar / Special Achievement Award
The Special Achievement Award is given to particularly noteworthy films and achievements without prior nominations. The prize was awarded for the first time in 1973 (always retrospectively for the last year, i.e. 1973 for achievements in 1972), since then at irregular intervals, most recently in 2018 to Alejandro G. Iñárritu for his VR project Carne y Arena .
Award winners
- 1973: The Poseidon Adventure (The Poseidon Adventure) - LB Abbott and AD Flowers (Visual Effects)
- 1975: Earthquake (Earthquake) - Frank Brendel , Glen Robinson and Albert Whitlock (Visual Effects)
- 1976:
- Die Hindenburg (The Hindenburg) - Peter Berkos (Sound Effects )
- The Hindenburg (The Hindenburg) - Albert Whitlock and Glen Robinson (Visual Effects)
- 1977:
- King Kong - Carlo Rambaldi , Glen Robinson and Frank Van der Veer (visual effects)
- Escape to the 23rd Century (Logan's Run) - LB Abbott , Glen Robinson and Matthew Yuricich (Visual Effects)
- 1978:
- Star Wars (Star Wars) - Ben Burtt (sound effects)
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Close Encounters of the Third Child) - Frank E. Warner (Sound Effect section)
- 1979: Superman - Les Bowie , Colin Chilvers , Denys Coop , Roy Field , Derek Meddings and Zoran Perisic (visual effects)
- 1980: The Black Stallion (The Black Stallion) - Alan Splet (Sound Editor)
- 1981: The Empire Strikes Back (The Empire Strikes Back) - Brian Johnson , Richard Edlund , Dennis Muren and Bruce Nicholson (Visual Effects)
- 1982: Raiders of the Lost Ark (Raiders of the Lost Ark) - Ben Burtt and Richard L. Anderson (Sound Effect section)
- 1984: Return of the Jedi (Return of the Jedi) - Richard Edlund , Dennis Muren , Ken Ralston and Phil Tippett (Visual Effects)
- 1985: Menschen am Fluß (The River) - Kay Rose (sound effects editor)
- 1988: RoboCop - Stephen Flick and John Pospisil (sound effects editor)
- 1989: Wrong Game with Roger Rabbit (Who Framed Roger Rabbit) - Richard Williams (animation director)
- 1991: Total Recall - Eric Brevig , Rob Bottin , Tim McGovern and Alex Funke (visual effects)
- 1996: Toy Story - John Lasseter (1st computer-animated feature film)
- 2018: Carne y Arena - Alejandro G. Iñárritu (VR project)