Academy Award nominations came out this morning. That means for the next six weeks or so we’ll compare films and roles that are completely different and try to decide which is the best. It’s sort of like asking which tastes better: raspberry cheesecake with chocolate ganache or a really good pizza.They’re completely different and it’s impossible to say that one is better than the other. (Except for Daniel Day Lewis. He’s always the best. Actor, I mean. Not food.)Inevitably there’s some controversy over the nominations. Since there are limited slots, someone always gets snubbed. Boo-hoo.It seems that most people were surprised that The Lego Movie wasn’t among the five films nominated for Best Animated Feature. From what I’ve read, some “experts” even thought it had a chance at being nominated for Best Picture. There are stories all over the web today about how surprising it is that it wasn’t nominated. Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
When it came out in February I read almost universally positive reviews from professional critics. Most of the kids and adults that I talked to liked it as well. It had unique characters, some funny jokes, and a song so catchy that you’d find yourself humming it days after you saw the film.So in February my wife and I packed up the Dry it in the Water brood and went to the theater to see it. And…I didn’t like it.It’s not that I hated it. Maybe I'm going overboard by saying that it sucks. I just don’t think it’s deserving of all of the praise it’s received. I think it has benefited from people saying how great it is, which causes other people to say how great it is because that’s what they’re supposed to say.But I just didn’t see greatness. About thirty minutes into it I looked over at my three youngest kids—9, 7 and 3 at the time—and they were all laughing, obviously enjoying it. And I thought to myself, “What am I missing here? Is this going to get better?”Unfortunately, it didn’t really get any better to me.The storytelling was all over the place, and the plot went off the rails a few times. There were a couple of points in which it seemed like the filmmakers realized that they couldn’t carry the story any further, so they just changed direction and hoped that the non-stop frenetic action throughout the film would keep the audience from noticing.Is this a story about saving the world from Lord Business, or about Emmet realizing that he really is special, or about friendship, or about selling more Lego sets? Maybe the filmmakers tried to make it about all of those things, but it was just too all-over-the-place.And if everyone’s living in a world where Lord Business is in charge, and Lord Business is so horrible, why is everyone so damn happy? If everything is awesome, how bad can Lord Business be?I do like the ending of the film. It’s the only part that really seemed to have heart to me. The rest of the film shows what happens when chaotic action, bright colors, catchy music, and a Grand Army of characters are substituted for actual storytelling and filmmaking.I think part of the problem may have been that I had zero empathy for Emmet, the main character who all of the other Lego yahoos thought had some special power. For most of the film I was hoping he’d meet some untimely demise as he transitioned from one of the dozens of realms to another.It’s hard to like a film when you’re rooting for the protagonist to bite the dust.He survived though (calm down, that’s not much of a spoiler), and everyone except for my wife (she has extraordinarily good taste!) and me loved it.But at least the Academy agreed with me!And we’re left with five other films that were nominated for Best Animated Feature. I haven’t seen any of them. However, in the past films like Toy Story 3, Finding Nemo, and, last year, Frozen, have won. I loved all of those films, and I think they all deserved to win.The Lego Movie, not so much.PREVIOUS POST: Run Again, MittIF YOU LIKED THIS POST I BET YOU'LL ALSO LIKE: I Wish I Could Live my Kids' Dreams+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Hey, how 'bout you Share this post on Facebook and Like my page Brett Baker Writes.