Oscars! Does any word fill a film-blog frequenter with as much emotion? God, I hope so. If not, and you’re one of those unhappy few that lives and dies for the Academy (re: an actor), then you’re probably excited to know that this year’s nominations are out! Rather than painstakingly reviewing each and every nomination, because that’s boring and unnecessary, as implied by my use of the word “painstakingly,” let’s just take a quick peek at some of the surprises.

Most of the Best Picture nominees were to be expected. I guess the big news is that BAFTA favorite Philomena got the nod, but the Coens’ Inside Llewyn Davis is mysteriously absent. Actually, Inside Llewyn Davis was not nearly as popular as one might have guessed. Failing to grab Best Picture, Screenplay, Director, and Song, the latest from the beloved Coens only landed a nomination for Best Cinematography. The same goes for Prisoners, by the way, which was never going to get nominated for anything, because the Academy has a woefully short attention span, but I’m very happy it grabbed the nod for Cinematography.

CBS Films
Poor boy.

General favorites Gravity, 12 Years a Slave, American Hustle, Her, and The Wolf of Wall Street basically acquired the expected nominations. Her, however, seemed to lose a number of potential categories to Alexander Payne’s Nebraska, Payne himself beating out director Spike Jonze for that category, and star Bruce Dern gathering the Best Actor nomination that many expected would go to Her leading man Joaquin Phoenix.

Warner Bros.
Again, poor boy.

Other than that, there weren’t many shockers in the major categories, except a couple surprise nominees in Supporting Actress, namely June Squibb for Nebraska and Julia Roberts for August: Osage County. The big question there will be if Lupita Ngyong’o (who in this writer’s opinion undisputedly deserves to win for 12 Years a Slave) will take home the award, or if the Academy will continue its love affair with Jennifer Lawrence, granting her yet another Oscar she hasn’t fully earned. I’ll also be interested in the Supporting Actor category, given Jared Leto’s wholly unexpected Golden Globes win for Dallas Buyers Club. Poor Michael Fassbender. I, at least, know how good he is. The Leading Actress category is a little less interesting this year, and may finally give Amy Adams what many consider an overdue win. The only big surprise was Emma Thompson’s snub for Saving Mr. Banks. Lead Actor, on the other hand, could go any which way. Leonardo DiCaprio for The Wolf of Wall Street and Matthew McConaughey for Dallas Buyers Club took home the big prizes at the Globes, but I personally think that Christian Bale for American Hustle and Chiwetel Ejiofor for 12 Years a Slave are still very much in the running. But whoa, Tom Hanks didn’t get nominated for Captain Phillips? That is very much a big surprise. Hanks, Phoenix, and Thompson: those are your big acting snubs of the year.

Fox Searchlight Pictures
Pictured: the three best performances of the year.

I would, however, like to turn your attention to the Best Animated Feature category, and the blasphemy that occurred there. Despicable Me 2 and The Croods got nominated, but Monsters University did not? Are you kidding me right now, Academy? That’s just unacceptable. Frozen’s definitely going to win that.

And I know that it’s uncool to pay any attention whatsoever to the technical awards, but who the hell bribed the Academy to nominate The Lone Ranger for anything, where on earth did all that money come from, and how is it that those goofy, over-the-top, implausible special effects beat out Pacific Rim? So, I guess Dallas Buyers Club is going to win Makeup, since its competition is The Lone Ranger and (somehow) Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa.

Disney
This movie got two nominations. Two. This movie. Two.

Whatever.

The Academy Awards ceremony is on March 2^nd, and we here at Rooster Illusion will be recapping it, because we’re awesome, and we will also be writing reviews of most of the nominated movies that we missed. Looking at the whole list, though, and discounting things like shorts and documentaries, because…you know…I think we’ve done a pretty good job so far. Below are all of the nominated films. Obviously, the ones you can actually click on are the ones we’ve actually reviewed, but check back periodically, as we’ll be updating this page with every new movie we review. For a complete inventory of which movies got what nominations, check your friendly neighborhood IMDb. The nominees, in order of most to least nominations, are:

1. American Hustle (10 nominations)
2. Gravity (10 nominations)
3. 12 Years a Slave (9 nominations)
4. Captain Phillips (6 nominations)
5. Dallas Buyers Club (6 nominations)
6. Nebraska (6 nominations)
7. Her (5 nominations)
8. The Wolf of Wall Street (5 nominations)
9. Philomena (4 nominations)
10. Blue Jasmine (3 nominations)
11. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (3 nominations)
12. August: Osage County (2 nominations)
13. Despicable Me 2 (2 nominations)
14. Frozen (2 nominations)
15. The Grandmaster (2 nominations)
16. The Great Gatsby (2 nominations)
17. The Lone Ranger (2 nominations)
18. Lone Survivor (2 nominations)
19. All Is Lost (1 nomination)
20. Alone Yet Not Alone (1 nomination)*
21. Before Midnight (1 nomination)
22. The Book Thief (1 nomination)
23. The Broken Circle Breakdown (1 nomination)
24. The Croods (1 nomination)
25. Ernest and Celestine (1 nomination)
26. The Great Beauty (1 nomination)
27. The Hunt (1 nomination)
28. Inside Llewyn Davis (1 nomination)
29. The Invisible Woman (1 nomination)
30. Iron Man 3 (1 nomination)
31. Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (1 nomination)
32. Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (1 nomination)
33. The Missing Picture (1 nomination)
34. Omar (1 nomination)
35. Prisoners (1 nomination)
36. Saving Mr. Banks (1 nomination)
37. Star Trek Into Darkness (1 nomination)
38. The Wind Rises (1 nomination)

*Nomination rescinded after dude found cheating.