A documentary! Animation! Science Fiction! Heart-warming comedy! No, they’re not all in one movie (but, boy, there’s an idea for you). They are, however, all coming our way this week. They do say that variety is the spice of life. Now we shall see if it’s the spice of moviegoing.

It’s a two and two week — two mainstream titles and two art titles (there’s a flood of art titles just now), and all in all, it looks like the art titles are the better deal, though it’s just possible that one of the mainstreamers will be a pleasant surprise. The other one? Far less likely. In fact, it’s so less likely that no one booked the lesser one after all. However, something else is!

Only three movies come our way this week. Two of them look … well, pretty grim — or so it seems to me. The third is something else altogether — and something that does much to make up for the other two. Some may disagree.

A singularly slack week is upon us — at least in terms of quantity. We’re only looking at one mainstream release and one art title. Of course, most the world is likely to be resting up after the headlong rush to shell out big bucks to see The Avengers last week. But the week’s two new offerings have something to be said for them.

Probably only a mere handful of us care that anything other than The Avengers is opening this week — and those of us who care about those other things probably are pretty ambivalent about The Avengers. It evens out. But the fact remains that there indeed are other things, and some of them are mighty tasty.

This is a week of riches where the art titles are concerned. It’s not all that unusual that we get three art movies in one week. It is unusual when we get three of them I’d classify as being in the “must-see” realm. And it’s even more unusual when it happens in April. For that matter, there are also four other movies of the mainstream variety headed our way. Offhand, they seem likely to be shy of the “must-see” realm.

Now that ActionFest is over (not that I got to deal with much of it — something easily explained when you see the volume of reviewing in this week’s paper), things can get back to normal. Judging by the week’s mainstream releases that may not be such a good thing. Thank Clapton for “art house” titles.

OK, look: It’s ActionFest weekend— what more do you really need to know prior to Monday? There are more movies than you can shake a stick at (if you care for that sort of thing) without having to even consider the rather grim prospect of such things as The Three Stooges. And I’ll be taking a sneak peak at that tomorrow. But for now, let’s go ahead and consider the week on the whole.

It’s not exactly what you might call a happening week — unless, of course, you have a burning desire to see Titanic with a coating of 3D. Otherwise, it’s down to two art titles and one mainstream milking of an elderly cash cow. It could be worse. No, it has been worse.

There may be nothing as keenly anticipated this week as The Hunger Games, but there’s hardly a shortage of titles. There are five new ones, in fact — and here’s a week where the art titles edge out the mainstream ones, at least in number. Just exactly how that will play out at the box office is, of course, another matter.

If it was measured in sheer quantity, the indie and art titles would win this coming weekend hands down—at least locally. There are three of them—and something else harder to quantify—up against one mainstream film. By rights, it ought to be a blood bath. And it will be, but with that solo juggernaut that is The Hunger Games the easy victor.