Ok I probably overreacted a bit before, sorry.
Still, it would be ironic if Peter Jackson were to get attacked by midgets. I guess if LOTR had any reason for winning it, it is in recognition of the vasts amount of effort that must have gone into it, which if fair enough.
Anyway I agree with Trigger mostly except about Master and Commander, which I felt was a far superior epic as a single movie than ROTK. Seabiscuit though was an above average movie that was really there more because of the story's cultural significance to American history. It was a decent movie as well, but probably not Oscar worthy.
So IMO 3 nominated movies were ROTK's superior. It's true that there will be plenty of Oscars for good drama in the future, but I'm just a little ticked that the Academy decided to save its recognition for LOTR in such a great year for movies. Would've been much more logical to recognise it in 2001 when the winner was 'A Beautiful Mind', another one of those Seabiscuit level movies, or last year when it was 'Chicago'.
Oh and has anyone noticed the trend in the last 16 years that Actors tend to get recognition for playing characters who have psychological problems or were mentally impaired? Here are some examples
2003- Senn Penn- Mystic River
1997- Jack Nicholson- As Good as it Gets-
1996- Geoffrey Rush- Shine
1995- Nicholas Cage- Leaving Las Vegas.. kinda, he was alcoholic
1994- Tom Hanks- Forrest Gump
1988- Dustin Hoffman- Rain Man
Also reconised
2002- Adrian Brody- The Pianist- Jewish musician in WWII..not sure if there was psychological trauma since I haven't seen it
2001- Russell Crowe- A Beautiful Mind- Russell didn't win, but we all know why that was
Actresses
2003- Charlize Theron- Monster
2002- Nicole Kidman- The Hours
2001- Halle Berry- Monster's Ball
2000- Hilary Swank- Boys Don't Cry
1993- Holly Hunter- The Piano
1990- Kathy Bates- Misery
These are just from the movies I have actually seen, so there may be a lot of other ones as well. Seems the way to get recognition with the Academy is to get a role as a mentally scarred person. Not taking anything away from the performances of any of these actors/actresses though... except possibly Halle Berry, because she won the award for the wrong reason.