February typically serves as a dumping ground for weak studio films that offer an easy alternative to “mainstream” audiences who don’t see Oscar bait, but this year has brought some welcome surprises.

Just one review this week, as I didn’t make it to “My Week with Marilyn,” playing in limited release. A look at that will come next week, along with reviews of the wide releases “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” and, time permitting, “The Sitter.” The studios’ insistence on conducting a take-no-prisoners December blitz with their prestige pictures has left things a tad crowded for the next few weeks, but I’ll do what I can…

We’re moving into the fall movie season this week with a look at Steven Soderbergh’s disease pot-boiler “Contagion,” with a review of Nicolas Winding Refn’s hotly anticipated crime thriller “Drive” coming next time. After that we’ll hit a bit of a lull with (tentatively scheduled) reviews of the lighthearted inside-baseball flick “Moneyball” and the cancer dramedy “50/50,” but I’m confident that things will pick up again soon. And, as I said before, be on the lookout for periodic horror-themed DVD picks as we approach Halloween.

Times like these, you have to seek comfort wherever you can find it. I often look to movies for some extra degree of solace, and it seems that sometimes it can be found in the unlikeliest of places.

I had intended to tackle “30 Minutes or Less” this week, but horrible reviews and the film’s highly questionable subject matter have tilted me toward using this column as an opportunity to take a quick look back on the summer movie season as it winds down, and preview some promising fall/winter releases.

1) Opening Sequence ("Gangs of New York," Dir. Martin Scorsese)

It's Oscar time again, and it's got me to thinking about why we as a culture place so much importance on and devote so much energy to following the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS).

The end of the decade coincides with the 10-year anniversary of this column, and what better way to mark the occasion than with an obsessive ranking of the decade's best films?

Growing up, there was meat on Halei Warren's family dinner table every night. She'd stare at it and push it away.

Here are News-Sentinel film critic Jason Wallis' picks for the Oscars, which will be announced Sunday:

"The Reader"

The Oscars are next weekend, and my disgust with one of the major nominees has put a damper on my usual mild excitement and healthy skepticism; right now I'm just on the verge of rage at the manner in which "The Reader" wasted two hours of my increasingly valuable time. (Note: My review of that film contains what some would consider spoilers, and I would agree if the film hadn't explicitly telegraphed literally everything it was going to do within the first 20 minutes.) Maybe I'll comfort myself by watching "Ghostbusters" for the 21st time.

More catching up. This week's titles will be familiar to those who caught the year-end top 10 roundup last time.

1. "The Dark Knight" (Christopher Nolan)

Over the past 10 years or so, I've made every effort to establish myself as "the Christmas guy." My friends and family may be annoyed that I start playing Christmas carols on my car stereo no later than Nov. 1, but one thing that everyone can seem to enjoy together is the tradition of trying to cram in as many Christmas movies and television specials as possible during the weeks heading up to the big day.

For the past couple weeks, even television coverage of the Olympics and political party conventions has been more interesting than the dull crop of new releases rolling out to theaters.

Laurence Olivier is regarded as cinema's premiere Shakespeare guru, and this reverence is well-earned; in such films as "Henry V," Richard III" and the Oscar-winning "Hamlet," he presented the Bard's works with proper respect and amazing consistence. Yet as much as Olivier deserves to be admired, I've always felt that it is actually Kenneth Branagh who has given us the greatest Shakespeare films. In his directorial debut "Henry V" and 1993's "Much Ado About Nothing," he presented audiences with faithful, impeccably produced adaptations that proved this kind of film need not be difficult and dreary, but can in fact be filled with life and (gasp!) accessible to most viewers.

My editor and I were having a conversation the other day about recent movies - specifically, about how there is absolutely nothing playing in wide release that appears to be worth seeing.