HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3: SENIOR YEAR

Sure, its storyline is simplistic and its romantic ballads are pretty dull (and compose half of the film's soundtrack), but in nearly every other way High School Musical 3: Senior Year is fantastic - a supremely spirited, candy-colored pop extravaganza that sends you out of the cineplex on an exultant high.

W.

I'm not exactly sure what kind of movie Oliver Stone's W. is trying to be, but that just makes it easier to appreciate it for what it is: A terrifically entertaining political comedy (with tragic undertones) that plays a bit like a sequel to Hal Ashby's 1979 Being There, in which a series of borderline-ludicrous circumstances find a friendly, well-meaning simpleton elected commander-in-chief. Now what?

There are low-budget films and there are low-low-budget films. And then there are low-low-low-budget films.

And then there's Octopoid Productions' Pickman's Song.

"We clocked the budget in at around a hundred dollars," says Octopoid co-founder Joshua Bentley of his East Moline company's 31-minute homage to a 1926 H.P. Lovecraft story. "A hundred dollars with plenty of guerrilla-film locations. You know, basically storming an old abandoned school in the middle of the night ... .

"The outside of the school," he quickly amends. "Not the inside. Nobody was inside any place they weren't supposed to be."

Hollywood, in its infinite wisdom, chose to open a whopping seven wide releases this past Friday, and since the market apparently wasn't glutted enough, also expanded distribution of the Ed Harris western Appaloosa from 14 theatres to 1,045. As business strategies go, this one was a bit of a head-scratcher, but it was refreshing to see a weekend when there truly was something new for everyone - the only people screwed in the deal, it seems, were movie critics without access to press previews.

Oh hey, that's me!