Lord of the Rings: Both sides of the argument

[Iris Alantiel]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR> All the Tolkienmania in the world shouldn't have more weight than a fair judging of the cinematic value of the best movies produced in one year. The fact that Return of the King is part 3 of 3 should have absolutely nothing to do with it. There is no Best Trilogy category. Acknowledge this, and deal with it.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>In a perfect world, this would be true, and movies would be judged solely on their cinematic value. However I think - and this is just my opinion - that the Academy will take into consideration the fact that Return of the King is part of a very popular trilogy that has not won any "important" Oscars yet. Maybe I'm just bitterly anti-Academy, but I personally believe that the Academy's decisions have less to do with which films are the true cinematic gems and more to do with politics and audience reaction. I mean, remember the hype around Titanic and how it won 11 Academy Awards? I watched Titanic again a few years later, after the hype was all finished, and wondered what it was we all thought was so great about it.<P>It's hard for me to remember all the way back at the very beginning of the year, but I went to the movies <I>a lot</I> during the summer, and it was a pretty slow summer - mostly sequels, nothing too outstanding, at least not that I can remember. (I admit to having a seriously bad memory.) So has anybody got any ideas what other movies might be a contender for Best Picture or any of the other main awards?