Just as there will always be stupid, horny teenagers, there will always be people who flock to the megaplex to watch those stupid, horny teenagers be brutally murdered: The “Friday the 13th” remake owned the weekend with a gross of $42.2 million, the best-ever opening for a horror film. Expect to see a lot of hockey masks this Halloween.

Surprisingly, the Clive Owen-Naomi Watts thriller “The International” opened at a distant seventh — below “Confessions of a Shopaholic”, even — with just $10 million. I guess that’s what happens when your evil bank doesn’t turn out to be run by an evil computer.

When will they learn? You can never have enough evil computers behind things. It’s the only way to explain Facebook … obviously, social data-mining is how Skynet keeps finding John Connor. Seriously, see if it doesn’t turn up as a plot point in “Terminator: Salvation”.

It’s a pretty big week for theatrical releases, but I’ve been working on so much other stuff — like the second annual Toronto Romanian film festival, about which more here — that I’ve managed to miss just about everything. And, as you can tell from the lateness of this post, I’m still working. So here’s a quicker-than-usual roundup:

“Confessions of a Shopaholic”: You know, a movie about a ditzy compulsive spender might not be the best thing right now. Dierdre feels the same way.

“Friday the 13th”: Both Andrew and Adam find Michael Bay and Marcus Nispel’s reboot of the venerable ’80s horror franchise more bearable than their ill-advised run at “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. Maybe it’s the lack of pesky subtext this time around?

“The International”: Neither Barrett nor Jason is particularly thrilled by Tom Tykwer’s paranoid actioner, which pits Clive Owen and Naomi Watts against an evil bank. I will be very disappointed if the evil bank is not run by an evil computer. You need levels on this stuff, people!

“Saving Luna”: A documentary about a stranded orca is getting mixed reviews — Adam liked it well enough, while Susan doesn’t have much time for it. (Check out the comment thread developing beneath Susan’s review — you’d think she’d just slammed “Toronto Stories”.)

“Trouble the Water“: Finally, a movie I’ve actually seen. You should see it, too. It’s really something.

“Under the Sea 3D”: I can never resist a 3D IMAX film, and this one was short, so I was able to squeeze in a screening earlier this week. It’s the usual large-format travelogue (narrated by Jim Carrey!), but the images are gorgeous, and it’s got playful sea lions! Awwww! Rad proved similarly vulnerable.

Okay, that’s everything. Well, not everything; there’s plenty of other stuff left to do this afternoon, so I’ll see you all tomorrow …

Another issue of NOW, another interview — this one with Tia Lessin, co-director (with Carl Deal) of the excellent Katrina documentary “Trouble the Water”, which opens in Toronto tomorrow after a year on the festival circuit.

That’s not them in the photo, by the way; that’s their subject, Kimberly Rivers Roberts (and her husband Scott), whose camcorder footage of the disaster provides a ground-level context for the disaster that struck New Orleans, and whose return to the city several weeks later — accompanied by Lessin and Deal — puts an immediate and human face on a story that still seems almost inconceivable three and a half years later.

There aren’t a lot of recent docs that I’d argue need to be seen on the big screen: “Standard Operating Procedure“, maybe, for its exquisite imagery and its mood, but even that works pretty well as a Blu-ray disc. “Trouble the Water”, though … well, here’s a story that needs to be experienced on an overwhelming scale. Because it was.

Have you been following the Joaquin Phoenix thing?

Last year, Phoenix announced that he was putting acting behind him, in order to focus on his music. This sounded like a set-up for an elaborate joke — and seemed to tilt decisively in that direction when it was revealed that actor Casey Affleck was following him around, shooting a documentary about his career transition — but now that Phoenix is back in front of journalists, doing the press tour for “Two Lovers”, he’s taking great pains to remind us that it’s all real.

I’m with director James Gray on this one; it may be real, but it’s awfully disappointing. Phoenix may be a temperamental sort — maybe not on Christian Bale’s level, but I once saw him punch out his own standee because someone had Photoshopped the staunch vegan into a leather jacket — but he can be an electrifying actor, and his performance in “Two Lovers” is up there with his best work.

Trouble is, thanks to Phoenix’ career change, no one’s paying any attention to the film. His decision to drop out of acting has effectively hijacked the press junket the same way Heath Ledger’s death turned the “Dark Knight” junket into a traveling memorial to the actor, which was frustrating as all hell for those of us who wanted to ask questions about the rest of the movie.

I mean, I was blown away by “Two Lovers” at Cannes, and would happily do anything I could to get people to see it here, but they’d have to release the damn thing first — and now I’m hearing the movie may go directly to DVD up here.

Anyway, bottom line: If you’re in New York or Los Angeles this weekend, catch “Two Lovers” at your local art house. And if you run into Phoenix at a club somewhere, ask him to do the responsible thing and just talk the damn movie up a little.

There’s an odd lack of tension in the news today. Oh, sure, Danny Boyle’s “Slumdog Millionaire” kicked all kinds of ass at the BAFTAs — and picked up a WGA award to go with its PGA, DGA and SAG prizes — but now that it’s gone from underdog to overdog, is anyone really surprised?

The box-office numbers are similarly just sort of there: The mega-sized chick flick “He’s Just Not That Into You” opened in first place, knocking last week’s champ, “Taken”, to second; the encouraging news is that Henry Selick’s “Coraline” placed third, ahead of presumptive hits “The Pink Panther 2” and “Push”.

One wonders how many small children woke up screaming from Other Mother nightmares over the weekend, but not having children myself, it’s a price I’m more than willing to pay.

I love lists — I crank ’em out for Sympatico/MSN on a fairly regular basis — and if you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you’ll have seen plenty of Onion AV Club inventories and suchlike. Today’s required reading comes from Topless Robot, by way of Cinematical: Ten Helpful Suggestions for Killing John Connor, the future messiah of the “Terminator” movies.

Make sure you read the comments. They’re filled with geeky goodness.

And yes, I know, Christian Bale jokes are so four days ago. But, y’know, having covered the industry as long as I have, it comes as no surprise that intense actors might have something of a hair-trigger on the set — especially on the sets of big effects movies where said actors are reminded, over and over again, that they’re just a cog in a much larger machine. (The same rule applies on television shows.)

Bale needs to do some indie projects right quick, is what I’m saying. Get his head straight. And then he can go be Batman again, shouting to his heart’s content.

It’s a bigger week for movie openings than usual — and the first week of the year to debut a brand-new movie that’s as good or better as the festival holdovers trickling out for Oscar season. Let’s get right to it:

“Cassandra’s Dream“: I’ve never seen an audience work harder to turn a thriller into a comedy as I did at the TIFF press and industry screening for Woody Allen’s 2007 dud. And when they gave up and started to walk out, you could feel the sadness. I stayed, but then I’m an idiot.

“Coraline“: Now, here’s a movie that knows precisely what it’s doing. Indeed, other than some pacing problems in the midsection, Henry Selick’s stop-motion delight is just about perfect. And see if you aren’t thoroughly creeped out by how much Other Wybie looks and moves like Heath Ledger’s Joker in the last act. It’s total coincidence … but man, is it disturbing.

“He’s Just Not That Into You”: That pop-culture catchphrase book from that “Sex and the City” writer becomes a multicharacter romantic dramedy … that’s 129 minutes long. Scarred by such efforts as “Playing by Heart”, I will wait for the DVD. But Susan liked it.

“Nurse. Fighter. Boy.”: I wasn’t able to catch Charles Officer’s directorial debut at TIFF, and it’s managed to elude me since. But it features actor-director Clark Johnson, who doesn’t spend nearly enough time in front of the camera, in my opinion, and the reviews are interesting — particularly Rad’s, which has generated a thread of comments that are much more civil than the one’s I’m used to — so I plan to check it out.

“The Pink Panther 2“: Sitting through the first one was torture, but the sequel has some surprisingly clever moments mixed in with the dopey slapstick, and much more interesting casting (John Cleese, Lily Tomlin, Alfred Molina). When the DVD comes out, you can rent it with your head held high.

“Push“: Is it a low-rent “X-Men” or a low-rent “Heroes”? I’m going with the former, since the whole point of “Heroes” was that ordinary characters were trying to cope with the sudden manifestation of super-powers, whereas the mutants here are already comfortable with their (exclusively psychic) gifts. The first half is pretty good; the second half, not at all. My review should be on the NOW site later today. UPDATE: There we go!

“Wendy and Lucy“: I’ve been talking this one up for nine months now, so the small-scale, minor-key intimacy of Kelly Reichardt’s shattering American drama — see? I did it again — may come as a disappointment to some of you. But not too many of you, I don’t think. Seek it out. Take the ride into the city. It’s really that good.

And if this long, oppressive winter has put you in a particularly grim frame of mind, Cinematheque Ontario’s comprehensive Carl Theodor Dreyer retrospective might be just the thing to reawaken your faith in cinema. When will you next get the chance to see “The Passion of Joan of Arc” with live piano accompaniment?

Okay, they’re screening it again on Thursday. But when after that?

The latest issue of NOW features my long-delayed interview with Kelly Reichardt, whose exquisite American drama “Wendy and Lucy” is finally opening tomorrow. Please give her a moment. There are a lot of movies coming out this weekend, but “Wendy and Lucy” is head and furry shoulders above them all.

Earlier this week, I spoke to Neil Gaiman; that interview is online now, too. No audio clips, regrettably; the recording was marred by someone’s Blackberry, which left stuttering blips on the track. (If you know a journalist, ask him or her about Blackberry audio interference sometime. Expect some tears.)

And finally, here’s a fine bit of news: Several months after leaving A Voce, my very talented friend Andrew Carmellini has finally found a new home … and a rather well-placed benefactor.

I expect they’ll tie the opening to the start of the Tribeca Film Festival in April … time to book another trip to New York!