Aside from one behemoth studio tentpole, this is a pretty light weekend, as far as every other movie studio is concerned. Not even the small indie films want to open against Disney’s swashbuckling cash cow. Who can blame them?

Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush and a few tiny characters return for ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides‘, the fourth installment of the money-making franchise. The fact that two of the three central cast members, Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley, did not want to return is a sign that you shouldn’t go back for more either.

Although ‘On Stranger Tides’ may be the best of the ‘Pirates’ movies since ‘The Curse of the Black Pearl‘, it sure doesn’t come close to matching up to the original. Like I said in my review yesterday, ‘On Stranger Tides’ is made for Jack Sparrow fans, not ‘Pirates’ fans. The movie is a meandering mess, an adventureless version of ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ where absolutely nothing is required of any of the characters to make it to the supposed-to-be climactic ending.

Woody Allen’s latest aesthetically pleasing romantic comedy ‘Midnight in Paris‘ opens on six screens this weekend. With positive buzz and a great cast including Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Michael Sheen, Marion Cotillard, Alison Pill, Adrien Brody and Kathy Bates, I cannot wait for this one to open in my region.

The only other noteworthy news this week is the expansion of Jodie Foster and Mel Gibson’s ‘The Beaver‘, which did surprisingly well when it opened on only 22 screens a couple weeks ago. Will it pick up steam as it goes wider?