It’s that time of year again, when superheroes fill the skies, aliens threaten and explosions abound. This year’s blockbusters look to be a strong selection (at least Michael Bay has real people in his movie this time), so let’s hope for a hot summer that will make staying in the air-conditioned theater a good option.

British film magazine Empire is widely considered one of the best mainstream film magazines in circulation today. In 2010, writers for the magazine put together a list titled “The 100 Best Films of World Cinema,” with “world cinema” defined as including any and all non-English films. Now, I’m a film and media studies major at Wash. U.

A couple of home runs and stolen bases later, I’ve seen enough baseball for the year and in half the time of your regular Yankees-Red Sox game. The story of Jackie Robinson, the first African-American to play in Major League Baseball, “42” is a solid little sports movie filled with all of the usual tropes and cliches, if a little light on the sports action.

It is a dilemma as old as the town of Schenectady, N.Y., itself: do we punish failure or reward ambition? In his new movie, “The Place Beyond the Pines,” director and co-writer Derek Cianfrance aims high, forgoing many of the rules of screenwriting and Hollywood cinema.

Focus Features recently hosted a college press junket to “The Place Beyond the Pines,” and I was lucky enough to be in attendance.

When I go to see a horror movie, I’m looking for three things: excessive amounts of gore, a reasonable level of campiness and genuinely surprising plot twists. “Evil Dead,” a remake of the 1981 cult classic directed by Sam Raimi, met and exceeded my expectations in all three of these regards.

Let’s face it. Scandals aside, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have lived quite the dream life. They both played Michelle on Full House, a childhood classic for any ’90s baby; they have their own fashion line that sells luscious clothing one can only lust after. Most importantly, they made a series of movies in which they prance around the world being awesome.

Finals are about to start. Reading week will bring hundreds of pages of essays to write. Stress levels will somehow rise even higher than they already are. But when you need a break from studying for that organic chemistry exam or writing that paper on hegemonic masculinities, Netflix is there for you.

“Cloud Atlas” proved a welcome surprise. From watching the trailer, I expected it to be piece of fluff about some romance transcending space and time. I was mostly right, but thankfully, “Cloud Atlas” goes far beyond just a romance based on reincarnation. To start with, it is a rare movie based solely on its numbers.

There is a fine line between grotesque and high art when dealing with exploding heads and blood-splattered walls. Few directors today are able to walk that line with the macabre hilarity that Martin McDonagh does.