The combination of Hot Summer Guide and post-Memorial Day lull means the film section in this week’s NOW was a little less labor-intensive than it’s been in recent weeks — and I’m thankful for that, because it only gets busier from here.

But I still have my share of stuff — here’s the movie content of the HSG, and a look at the Terrence Malick retrospective starting up at the Lightbox on Saturday. (I may prefer Malick’s earlier, funny films, but “The Thin Red Line” and “The New World” are still worth seeing on a big screen.) Oh, and Susan and I did a little thing about our favourite scenes from Woody Allen’s movies, which you may or may not enjoy.

And now, I must scramble off. I did say it gets busier …

Surprising no one in particular, “The Hangover Part II” had a really good weekend — though the scale of its success surprised even the industry. The buddy sequel led the box office to its biggest Memorial Day weekend ever, with an estimated five-day total of $138.1 million — the strongest opening for a comedy, and for any R-rated film.

No slouch itself, “Kung Fu Panda 2” pulled in an estimated $68.2 million in the same window, which would seem to guarantee that Jeffrey Katzenberg green-lights the other four movies in the saga of the Dragon Warrior. And Bradley Cooper seemed pretty confident that there’d be a third “Hangover” movie when we talked the other week, so I guess that’s happening.

Personally, I’m kinda hoping for a crossover. Something tells me Mr. Chow would be right at home in a mystical land of talking animals.

The last thirteen hours have been a charming flashback to the summer of 2007, when I spent every weekend shuttling back and forth from Toronto to Manhattan — and almost always encountered some form of weather-related delay on the LaGuardia end.

I’m posting this week’s review roundup from a Sheraton in Queens. How’s your morning?

“L’Amour Fou”: Rad does not think much of Pierre Thoretton’s documentary about the late Yves Saint Laurent, as remembered by his partner Pierre Berge. After the recent deluge of fashion docs, I cannot say I was interested to see it at all, so it’s nice that he took the hit.

“Beauty Day”: Jay Cheel’s documentary about the ups and downs of self-destructive St. Catharines maniac Ralph Zavadil — better known to his cable audience as Cap’n Video — rides its Hot Docs buzz into a theatrical run. Glenn found it fascinating.

“Bobby Fischer Against the World“: This workmanlike documentary about the famously unstable chess master is undone by director Liz Garbus’ insistence that Fischer was driven mad by the intricacies of the game — a pop-psychological assessment that feels simplistic at best, foolish at worst. Worth seeing for the archival footage, I guess.

“The Collapsed“: Justin McConnell’s admirably modest apocalyptic thriller opens with confidence and looks pretty good, but the script and the acting just aren’t where they need to be to make it work at feature length.

“The Hangover Part II“: Second verse, exactly the same as the first. But it works, somehow, thanks to a script that’s much smarter than it initially seems, strong performances from Helms, Cooper and Galifianakis and the understanding that a little Ken Jeong goes a very long way.

“The Invisible Eye“: Diego Lerman’s character study of a repressed teacher (the very good Julieta Zylberberg) whose psychological deterioration mirrors the collapse of Argentina’s dictatorial regime would seem a lot fresher had Michael Haneke never made “La Pianiste”, which is basically the same movie, in German, with Isabelle Huppert. C’est la guerre, I guess.

“Kung Fu Panda 2“: As gorgeously realized and exhilarating to watch as the first film — and after that and “How to Train Your Dragon”, concrete proof that DreamWorks Animation can compete with Pixar on its own turf. And Pixar never cast Gary Oldman as a genocidal peacock.

“Little White Lies“: Guillaume Canet’s Gallic “Big Chill” sends Francois Cluzet, Marion Cotillard, Benoit Magimel and Laurent Lafitte off for a seaside vacation in the wake of a friend’s motorcycle accident, then watches as their passive-aggression slowly moves towards full-on aggression. It might have worked at 100 minutes, but not at 150.

There, that’s everything. And now, back to the airport, to play the waiting game all over again …

The latest issue of NOW is out, and I own that mother-humper — it’s the Summer Movie Preview, featuring interviews with two-thirds of the cast of “The Hangover Part II”:  Zach Galifianakis is our cover boy, and Bradley Cooper has his back.

I also take a semi-comprehensive look at more than fifty films opening in the next three months — and yeah, I know, calling “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” a film is stretching things a little. And it’s not part of the cover package, but I also offer an overview of the impending Worldwide Short Film Festival, which had better be the last goddamn film festival I cover until TIFF.

Why, yes — I do believe I’ve earned a couple of days off, thank you very much.

Oh, great. The bloated carcass of “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” made $90.1 million at the box office this weekend and earned another $256.3 million internationally, guaranteeing we’ll be seeing Cap’n Jack Sparrow swash his increasingly tatty buckle yet again.

(And again after that, since this film is positioned as the first in a new trilogy, on account of that working so well for everyone the first time around.)

The negative reviews? Unimportant. The middling reaction from audiences? Equally irrelevant. They bought their tickets, didn’t they? That means the “Pirates” brand sells, and that means Disney makes more of it. After all, Universal follows exactly the same formula for the “Fast and the Furious” series, and no one’s complaining about those.

At least “Bridesmaids” held onto second place. That’s something, surely.

Against all odds, I have emerged from the insane crush of yesterday. I’ve met my deadlines, filed my files, and my head’s still on my torso. Of course, I still have all the other stuff I have to do this week, and I’ll be getting to it now, but first, here’s this week’s movie reviews, because I’m conscientious like that. Enjoy!

“The First Grader“: Justin Chadwick has made some excellent television — he directed the recent BBC/PBS adaptation of “Bleak House” — but give him a feature and he’s completely at sea. After the stiff cheese (cheesy stiffness?) of “The Other Boleyn Girl“, he turns inspirational drama into patronizing pablum with this true story of an ancient Kenyan (Oliver Litondo) who demands an education and the young teacher (Naomie Harris) who helps him achieve his goal. It’s too professionally produced to dismiss outright, but I could barely stand to sit through it.

“Forks Over Knives“: Hey, did you know that processed foods and high-fructose corn syrup are really bad for you, especially if they’re all you eat? It’s true! Also true, apparently, is that drinking the right amount of milk can “turn off” cancer, and that shopping at Whole Foods means you’ll never get sick, you won’t get any older and you won’t ever die. Really, that’s the level at which Lee Fulkerson’s credulous advocacy doc operates, and that’s not good for anyone.

“Last Night“: Sam Worthington and Keira Knightley are a young couple contemplating stepping out on one another after a fight — with Eva Mendes and Guillaume Canet, respectively. I had huge problems with Massy Tadjedin’s elliptical style, but the actors have their moments — particularly Canet, who gives his incidental character a dignity and grace that threatens to destabilize the whole picture.

“The National Parks Project“: Or, “Thirteen Short Films About Going Outside”. Offering thirteen very different directors the chance to wander Canada’s national parks with a trio of randomly assembled musicians is a terrific idea, and it makes for a largely pleasant experience, but the results are probably best viewed separately — or over two or three sittings — rather than in one two-hour chunk. That said, if you just want to bliss out on the visuals, the theatrical presentation can’t be beat.

“Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides“: Not strange enough, frankly — just a bloated, unnecessary sequel that brings back Johnny Depp’s Cap’n Jack Sparrow (and a couple of other key characters) for another round of ersatz swashbuckling adventure, with Rob Marshall replacing Gore Verbinski as director and demonstrating, once and for all, his complete lack of vision. The worst thing about it? It tries to set up another trilogy.

There, that’s everything. Oh, except that it isn’t — the Toronto Underground Cinema has tapped me to host the latest Defending the Indefensible session, for which Will Sloan and Andrew Parker will square off against the judgmental specter of Adam Nayman over “Observe and Report”. (For the record, I really like it.) That gets going tonight at 7 pm; if you’re intrigued by our frequent invocations of “Taxi Driver”, you might want to come back to the theatre on Sunday for a double-bill of both films, with “Taxi Driver” screening at 7 pm and “Observe and Report” at 9:30. I’ll be hosting that, too, the better to help people understand the connections — and just enjoying the chance to see “Taxi Driver” on the big screen, frankly.

Full details are available at the Underground’s website, but you’ve already got the gist of it, yeah?