Since this is the week that Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides opens, it’s otherwise a slack week in the realm of mainstream releases. Put simply, no studio in its right mind wants to go head-to-head with Capt. Jack Sparrow and his crew. However,  this is Asheville where we have The Carolina and the Fine Arts, meaning that indie/art titles will go where the mainstream fears to tread, which in this case means that The Greatest Movie Ever Sold and Bloodworth are opening at The Carolina, and Potiche is opening at the Fine Arts. As Zero Mostel once said, “That’s for those of you who have absolutely no interest in pirates.”

I suppose it happens less often these days, but I imagine it still does happen that most people with a serious interest in movies have—or have had—some title or other they’ve read about or heard about that they’ve never been able to see. This used to be common back in the pre-video days. Now, it sometimes seems that nearly everything your little viewing heart could desire is but a trip to the video store, a browse on Amazon, or even a mouse or remote control click away. That’s not really true, of course, but it’s certainly more the case now that it ever was. I sometimes wonder if this is necessarily a good thing.

Put bluntly, last week’s releases were pretty darn grim. When the best thing that opened—apart from the art title Of Gods and Men—was an action movie starring Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, and Dwayne Johnson. you know things weren’t looking any too rosy. What of this week? Well, there are two indies—Rubber and I Am (both at The Carolina)—two rom-coms of sorts—Jumping the Broom and Something Borrowed (everywhere but Carmike)—and, of course, Thor (again, everywhere but Carmike). So what of them? What indeed.

The other evening Justin Souther and I—and maybe a few others—were loitering in the bar of the Cinema Lounge of The Carolina having a meaningful conversation in depth (read: we were killing time) when—for reasons that are obscure to me now—I chanced to mention the movie Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory (1962). Upon invoking said title, I found myself on the receiving end of one of those looks. You know the kind—expressing disbelief in your veracity. I made it clear that indeed there is such a movie and that it could hardly be said to live up to its title. This in turn led to the discussion that brought us to the state of events you’re encountering now.

This is one of the stranger weeks to come along. There are quite a few movies opening—none of the seem to qualify as entirely wide releases. The only art movie opening is Of Gods and Men at The Carolina. And there’s a small fact-based, faith-based uplifting sports drama, The 5th Quarter, that appears to be opening only at the Beaucatcher. Neither of these being limited to one screen is surprising. But what of Dylan Dog: Dead of Night, Fast Five, Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil, and Prom?

Having just encountered Tyler Perry’s tenth self-directed feature, Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family, and his eleventh big screen venture (he didn’t direct the first one), it’s incredible to realize that prior to February of 2005, I had never even heard of a Tyler Perry. That’s about the time the standee for Diary of a Mad Black Woman went up in the lobby of the theater that qualified as my day job. Just glancing at it, I was intrigued by the title and thought this might be something worth checking out. (That translates as “something I wasn’t going to fob off on another reviewer.”) I did notice that the name Tyler Perry was more prominently—and more often—featured than that of the titular director, Darren Grant, and I read up on just who this Perry fellow was.

Last week’s ActionFest—which was eschewed by some cineastes who don’t like “action”—and my narrow escape of having to watch Soul Surfer—which I was spared thanks to Justin Souther—give rise to the question of what people just plain, flat-out, categorically, without fear of going back on it, simply won’t watch. Since I long ago surrendered the possibility of playing the “you couldn’t pay me to watch that” card, my own feelings in the matter are largely theoretical. At the very least, my feelings are reliant on whether or not someone else can be forced or somehow cajoled into stepping into the breach. Most of the world has no such consideration. So what evokes my paraphrase of Mr. Astaire’s song about not dancing in you?