Get to the theatah! California's (thankfully, former) Governor returns to the multiplex to do what he does best: speak in one-liners and carry a big gun. My review of The Last Stand below the jump, along with short takes on the Mark Wahlberg-Russell Crowe crime drama Broken City, and more.

Also this week: Hellbound?, a doc about damnation at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (Dennis Harvey's take here); the Mostly British Film Festival (my round-up here); and the Guillermo del Toro-endorsed horror flick Mama, starring Jessica "Zero Dark Oscar" Chastain. Plus, tonight, the original Django (1966) screens at the Castro! More here.

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Well, they announced the Oscar nominations yesterday, and much-lauded import Amour is opening today (review below the jump), so if you're curious about the hype and don't mind having a downer of a Friday night ... you're set. Other films opening this week include the Robert Carlyle drama California Solo (Dennis Harvey's review here), Marlon Wayans horror spoof A Haunted House, Ryan Gosling-in-a-fedora cop flick Gangster Squad, and (at the Roxie), teen-skater doc Only the Young.

Also! The Pacific Film Archive's "The Hills Run Red: Italian Westerns, Leone, and Beyond" series starts this week. Plenty of good spaghetti western action to be had; check out my round-up here. Read on for more short takes on this week's releases.

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At last, the movie most likely to challenge Lincoln for Best Picture opens in San Francisco, with an even wider release coming next week. Check out my review of Zero Dark Thirty here. Highly recommended, and even if it doesn't snag the top trophy, look for Jessica Chastain to win Best Actress. (More Oscar predictions here, in case you're getting your pool in order extra-early.)

Also this week: Texas Chainsaw 3D (the first two films in this series, I'll defend to the death ... no interest in seeing this one, frankly), a re-release of Luis Buñuel's 1970 drama Tristana, and freewheeling New Orleans doc Tchoupitoulas (reviews of the latter two after the jump).

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