Michelle's Top 5 of Summer '10

For me, this summer was all about trippy films, be it 3D, mind games or lab experiments gone wrong in every way. Most times it was about being charmed by a beautiful idea, but sometimes it just felt good to be a little girl again. It was like a unconventional summer stay-cation, visiting times and concepts and oddities. Don't forget to pack your thinker!

5) Toy Story 3

Definitely one of the most anticipated films of the summer, led-up to with Toy Story and its sequel and brought back to theatres in 3D. The first two successful films weren't originally done in 3D and it seemed kind of risky to put the third out in 3D given all the major 3D failures lately. It's just that much sweeter when a film rocks it against doubts. But this film couldn't have done it for me without Barbie (Jodi Benson) and Ken (Michael Keaton), cracking jokes about Ken's all too obvious unmanliness and his destined love with Barbie.

Photo: allmoviephoto.com

4) Despicable Me

Steve Carell and Jason Segel is more than enough to sell a film but when it comes to kids films, we expect something corny, especially when it's about a two supposed evil masterminds and three chipmunk-cheeked little girls selling cookies. Doesn't leave much room for jokes for the parents but for those of us who are still secretly a five-year-old version of ourselves, this film was just right. I mean, come on, silly faces and sounds are still funny.

Photo: allmoviephoto.com

3) Mr. Nobody

This film was all about possibilities. What could have been? What was? They're both meshed in this film. It's an idea so limitless-ly fulfilling that it's depressing, if that even makes sense. Not that it's easy to understand much of the film itself. It's a futuristic utopian/dystopian film set to make us appreciate the way we live our lives right now, but also reminding us of the choices we've had in our own lives. In other words, it's a film for those who hobby thinking.

Photo: teaser-trailer.com

2) Splice

This film's beauty was in its unpredictability. Like Mr. Nobody, the film played with a utopian/dystopian idea: What if we could create animal-human hybrids? The results were repulsive, sweet, terrifying and sexy. This idea was intertwined with the story of a young couple going through their young couple woes but totally shaken up by this new being in their lives. In simplest terms, this film is very, very weird and discomforting. But some of us love that kind of thing.

Photo: allmoviephoto.com

1) Inception

How awesome is it when your most anticipated film of the summer actually meets your expectations? Come on. Who doesn't want to a see a film set in imaginations of stunningly unfamiliar worlds where the earth can fold over above or people can die but don't really die or where you can pry through others' thoughts? Just wow. Beautiful idea, great execution and a cast that fits almost seamlessly together. What more could you ask for? And not that I'm an Ellen Page fan but I like to root for my Canadians and this film seemed like a step, albeit a baby step, away from her usual troubled teenager role and into the clever college student role. Who knows, maybe next we'll see her a struggling young adult.

Photo: allmoviephoto.com

Mr. Nobody

Photo: mrnobody-lefilm.com

(Nobody, really.)

Starring Jared Leto, Diane Kruger and Sarah Polley. Directed by Jaco Van Dormael. 138 minutes. 14A

Imagine a life where you never had to make choices. What do you want for breakfast? What film will you watch this evening? Or who will you marry five years from now? Instead, you could have it all at once. It also sounds too excessive to be fulfilling. Would you ever really savour anything? Would you ever even want anything anymore? But it at least sounds like a life a lot less worrying. It's the life Mr. Nobody lives. Or doesn't live. If he even exists at all.

In Mr. Nobody, Nemo Nobody (Jared Leto) is a 117-year-old man living in 2092, when he will be the last man to die of natural causes. It's an odd world. Many objects float, no one has sex anymore and people take vacations to Mars. Nemo stars in a reality show, seemingly unknowingly, where the world watches the last days of his life while doctors and scientists and journalists try to figure out who this old man once was. Meanwhile, Nemo has flashbacks of his youthful life.

Leto doesn't say much as a young Nemo, instead his wide-eyes and heavy breathing carry scenes. However, as an old man, he shouts in passionate anger and revels in memories. His voice is withered and wispy. He blinks solemnly. It's almost as if Leto is an old man and his younger scenes are the ones under heavy makeup. Hey, who knows. It seems anything is possible in this film.

Mr. Nobody is a film for the thinker, but not in the Matrix-y way where the story is told and it's up to you to understand it. Instead, Mr. Nobody melds life and death; reality and fiction; past, present and future; and alternate plot lines. It's not about trying to figure out what's actually going on, but rather gets you to think about the what ifs, both in the film and your own life.

Aside from beautiful ideas, the cinematography is also interesting. It's very artsy and simple. It almost feels like stepping into a modern art gallery. It perfectly compliments the quirky, thoughtful narrative.

It's a great film to get lost in, whether you're tracing story lines or entranced by composition or tangled somewhere else in your own thoughts. A