This was the first year in a while that I have not seen any contenders in the category...

John Wick was better.

Life Itself is solid, but I LOVE 20,000 Days on Earth; Finding Vivian Maier; and Maidentrip. I still need to see the Snowden one.

Now it's Groucho's turn to present Best Animated Film

Nah. People almost overvalue John Wick. It is chic and exciting and "cute," but nowhere near as majestic and ferocious as The Raid 2.

Although the academy ignored The Lego Movie, WOKJ members didn't. But is that enough for it to win?

Let's face it, there were a lot of great animated films released this year, some of which were tremendously well reviewed. Using the Tomato Score, here's how animated films did in 2014:

The Tale of Princess Kaguya (100%)
Ernest and Celestine (97%)
Song of the Sea (97%)
The Lego Movie (96%)
How to Train Your Dragon 2 (92%)
Big Hero 6 (90%)
The Wind Rises (89%)
The Book of Life (82%)
Mr. Peabody and Sherman (79%)
The Boxtrolls (75%)
Penguins of Madagascar (72%)
Rio 2 (48%)
Planes: Fire & Rescue (44%)
Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return (14%)
The Nut Job (10%)

Overall, that's a pretty good list of good films there. But who has seen Kaguya? Even if it does deserve to win, will it?

Animators themselves chose "Dragon 2" at the Annies. Of course, the Oscar is voted on by everyone and not just those in the animated film branch, so who knows what they will pick.

Anyway, I'm not going to waste time here discussing why Lego was ignored at the Oscars. Let's just see who we liked.

The nominees are:

Big Hero 6

directed by Don Hall & Chris Williams

How To Train Your Dragon 2

directed by Dean DeBlois

The Boxtrolls

directed by Graham Annable & Anthony Stacchi

The Lego Movie

directed by Phil Lord & Christopher Miller

The Tale of Princess Kaguya

directed by Isao Takahata

This could be interesting...

Hate, hate, hate How to Train Your Dragon 2. Hope it does not win.

Go, Boxtrolls!

Is everything awesome?

Well, I wanted Boxtrolls -- the most original and clever of the group. But Nooooooooo

The winner is

THE LEGO MOVIE

runner up: Dragon 2

Good.

Still need to see Dragon 2 and Boxtrolls though.

Second.

This would have been awesome with a full audience. Alas, there were only 7 ppl watch it in my audience

Slight correction there, the runner-up was actually Big Hero 6

Did someone collapse backstage?

Are you there, Arthur?

Oops! Not sure how I did that. I read your email and then lost it and my memory failed me. I guess I remembered it wasn't Boxtrolls so I didn't care.

I will next present Best Original Score in lieu of Algren

Best Original Score

A film rarely achieves greatness without also producing great musical accompaniment. A film’s score is sacred, and without it, a film is just a series of moving images lacking any punch or steer of emotion and feeling. I adore film scores, and I seldom grade a movie highly if the score doesn’t help in taking me along for the journey.

As the director of F.I.S.T., Norman Jewison, said; “You can take almost any edited visual film sequence and change the emotion and feelings engendered by the use of music.”, and it’s with that high regard for music that I am proud to announce the nominees for Best Original Score.

The nominees are:

Interstellar
Gone Girl
Birdman
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Under the Skin

This seems an easy win for Interstellar and Hans Zimmer, though I am pulling for Alexandre Desplat's Grand Budapest Hotel score.

C'MON GONE GIRL!!!

And the winner is...

Hans Zimmer (Interstellar)

Runner-up: Alexandre Desplat (The Grand Budapest Hotel)

Ah, it's the age

AH LAME!