OKAY, SO I HAVE TOO MUCH TIME ON MY HANDS: The best of the year so far

I know there's three and a half months left until the end of the year, but since I have a little free time, I thought I'd go ahead and list my best of the year so far. This list will surely change come January of next year (and I don't have a fourth supporting actress), but here it is anyway.

BEST PICTURE

Mother

The rest are in no particular order:

3 Idiots

Mesrine, Parts I and II

The Killer Inside Me

Mother and Child

Toy Story 3

Scott Pilgrim v. The World

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work

Animal Kingdom

Cyrus

Winter’s Bone

BEST ACTOR

Aamir Kahn--3 Idiots

Vincent Cassel – Mesrine, Parts I and II

Casey Affleck—The Killer Inside Me

John C. Reilly—Cyrus

Ben Stiller--Greenburg

BEST ACTRESS

Hye-ja Kim--Mother

Annette Benning—The Kids Are All Right; Mother and Child

Tilda Swinton—I Am Love

Noomi Rapace--The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; The Girl Who Played With Fire

Jennifer Lawrence--Winter’s Bone

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Helena Bonham-Carter—Alice In Wonderland

Jacki Weaver--Animal Kingdom

Dale Dickey--Winter’s Bone

Catherine Keener—Cyrus, Please Give

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Gerard Depardieu—Mesrine, Part I, Killer Instinct

Kieran Caulkin—Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Ned Beatty--Toy Story 3

John Hawkes--Winter’s Bone

Mickey Rourke--Iron Man 2

BEST ENSEMBLE

Cyrus

Animal Kingdom

BEST DIRECTOR

Christopher Knight—Inception

Joon-ho Bong--Mother

Edgar Wright--Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Rajkumar Hirani--3 Idiots

Michael Winterbottom--The Killer Inside Me

BEST SCREENPLAY

Eun-kyo Park, Joon-ho Bong, Wun-kyo Park--Mother

Rodrigo Garcia--Mother and Child

Michael Bacall, Edgar Wright--Scott Pilgrim v. the World

Mark and Jay Duplass--Cyrus

David Michod--Animal Kingdom

AND WE'RE OFF: Review of 3 Idiots

This is my first review of a 2010 movie. The countdown for next year's Howies begins.

3 Idiots, a new Bollywood movie, is silly, ridiculous, overly sentimental with a wobbly tone and pounds you over the head with its message. But after about twenty minutes, something happens and you become so overwhelmed by its good nature and its energy, that you just give in and by the time the credits roll, you come out of the theater feeling absolutely wonderful (the showing I was at, a couple left just before things got good; in all honesty, I was about to join them, but thank god, I didn’t). The movie is an attack on the Indian college system like Charles Dickens’ Hard Times is an attack on the English school system and The Paper Chase is an attack on the values that U.S. law schools instill in their students. In the India of this movie, children are told what they are going to major in by their parents at the moment of birth (if you’re a man, you become an engineer; if a woman, a doctor). The pressure to succeed is so great, that India, according to the movie’s hero, has the highest college suicide rate in the world. The three idiots are freshman roommates. One doesn’t want to be an engineer, but wants to be a wildlife photographer, so he can’t put his heart into his studies. A second has to succeed because his parents are so poor; as a result he becomes blocked by fear of failure and he also can’t do well. The third idiot is Rancho, played by Amir Khan, one of India’s most popular stars (he was the lead in another Indian movie that also attacked the Indian school system, Like Stars on Earth). Rancho is someone so in love with engineering, he has no trouble succeeding. But he is also a rebel, refusing to go along with the status quo, always questioning the teachers, the dean and his biggest enemy, played by Rajeev Ravindranathan, who is determined to be the best, but just can’t pass Rancho. You can try to resist Khan’s charms, but I wouldn’t advise it. He just gives the movie his all and there’s little you can do but join in and let him make you happy. And then, just at intermission, the plot takes a weird turn and the story speeds off in a new, but fun, direction. There are plenty of musical numbers, the oddest one perhaps taking place in the dorm shower room, complete with singers singing while sitting on the toilet. But the high point, musically has to be the love song between Rancho and Pia, the daughter of the dean that Rancho falls in love with. Probably a movie you’ll have to seek out to see, but it’s well worth it.