The week before the American Thanksgiving holiday is notoriously quiet, as the majors prepare for the biggest Wednesday of the year … leaving a hole open for everyone else. Oh, and Disney.

“Ballast“: Lance Hammer’s indie drama is a calm, measured and utterly devastating study of three lives on a collision course on the Mississippi Delta. Yes, I know, that’s annoyingly vague; the mechanics of the plot are so delicate that I don’t want to risk denting them. Anyway, great movie, please go see it.

“Bolt”: John Travolta is a talking dog! Miley Cyrus is a talking person! Animated adventure ensues! I, um, had scheduling conflicts.

“Growing Op”: Didn’t see this one, either, but it stars Wallace Langham, whom I’ve enjoyed ever since his glory days fighting with Sarah Silverman on “The Larry Sanders Show” — and Adam found it inoffensive.

“I Can’t Think Straight”: The other Lisa Ray/Sheetal Seth/Shamim Sarif movie to open in Toronto this month, after “The World Unseen” two weeks ago; this one’s a contemporary romantic comedy about women in love, which Susan found far more palatable.

“Repo! The Genetic Opera”: Were you as disappointed as I was when Anthony Stewart Head literally bumped into Johnny Depp in Tim Burton’s “Sweeney Todd”, and wandered off without singing a note? Well, now’s your chance to hear those pipes a-bursting in the service of Darren Lynn Bousmann’s gore-drenched rock opera, which Barrett holds in pretty high regard.

“Twilight”: She gave us this generation’s “Reefer Madness” with “Thirteen”, turned “Lords of Dogtown” into a self-satisfied snooze and turned “The Nativity Story” into a Grade-Z act of Christian pandering; now, Catherine Hardwicke takes Stephenie Meyer’s young-adult novel and turns it into a borderline incompetent movie of the week, built around the wet-blanket Kristen Stewart and the truly ridiculous Robert Pattinson. Yeah, it’s going to make money. No, there won’t be another one any time soon.

Gotta run — CTV Newsnet wants me on to talk about “Twilight”. 11:15 am, Rogers cable 62; check it out, if you’re able.