A fall weekend is a perfect time to see a new movie, even if that new movie is about cancer or haunted houses or catastrophic natural disaster. Those are the movies debuting this weekend.

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50/50

Beautiful Joseph Gordon-Levitt is afflicted with terrible cancer in this serio-comedy about death and life and everything in between. Seth Rogen is on hand to do his usual teddybear schlumpiness and Anna Kendrick plays her Air Up There (or whatever) character, just with a different job. It's actually been getting decent reviews, so if you want a downer chased with an upper this weekend, this is your best bet. (Wide release)

American Teacher

This is a Matt Damon-narrated movie about society's biggest drain: public school teachers. Those selfish bastards do the work of ensuring that our society will continue to function in a civilized manner in the future and then they have the gall, the utter absurd nerve, to ask us to pay them for that service so they can live and eat and raise their own children and buy our children school supplies. These people are disgusting. If you want to watch a movie about disgusting people, watch this piece of teat-sucking crap. (Limited)

Bunraku

A bunch of weirdos (Josh Hartnett, Ron Perlman, Woody Harrelson, Demi Moore) star in this cartoony action movie about cartoon people doing cartoon things. It's basically Cool World except not at all Cool World. That appealing to you? Then sure, knock yourself out, go see this thing. (Limited)

Courageous

In this family drama, police officers try to be the best men that they can, for both their jobs and their families. Luckily for them there's a triple-entitied magic ghost living in space who talked to people a few thousand years ago and thus defined how to live for the rest of time, so they have that to turn to. Lucky them! (Wide)

Dream House

This horror movie is two hours of terrifying footage of me lying in bed and looking at the New York Times Real Estate section slideshows and weeping because I will never be able to afford those houses. The climax is when I order food on SeamlessWeb. That part is really scary. (Wide)

Finding Joe

This is a documentary about Joseph Campbell and mythology and how the tropes in mythology — heroes overcoming odds, etc. — can be applied to our own lives to make us better. Experts like Deepak Chopra, Sir Ken Robinson, and... Rashida Jones weigh in on this idea. Looks kind of like an ad for some kind of cult. (Limited)

Margaret

This long-delayed (Anna Paquin plays a high schooler) drama from Kenneth Lonergan tells the story of a young woman who feels she caused someone's death and feels bad about it. Other New Yorky things happen and people talk a lot and apparently it all doesn't add up to much. Too bad. (Limited)

Munger Road

This is a horror movie about a killer stalking kids and two police officers trying to catch the killer blah blah. It's all very standard and run-of-the-mill, which leads to the question of why then name the road Munger? You could have picked literally any road name! Kill Road. Creepytown Alley. Death Court. But nope. Munger. Mung. You chose to associate your movie with the word "mung." I just don't get it. (Limited)

My Joy

A movie about violent life in a small, isolated Russian town, My Joy reminds us of what a miserable place Russia can be. Right, because every other Russian movie doesn't quite hit that point home. (NY)

Take Shelter

This well-reviewed drama tells the tale of a man mentally unraveling because of a sense of impending doom. Is that doom real or imagined? That's the mystery of this movie, which is probably the one you should see this weekend. (NY & LA, opening wider next month)

Tucker & Dale Vs. Evil

The joke here is that the two rednecks are nice guys and that the kids in the woods keep getting killed by accident. How long can that one joke hold up an entire movie? There's only one way to find out. (Limited)

What's Your Number?

Anna Faris hauls her hijinks to Boston in this romantical comedy about a lady trying to figure out which former sex partner is the man of her dreams, because of a magazine quiz. Chris Evans plays the guy helping her and of course there is no way they'll fall in love because he's just the guy helping her, so why would they get together?? That would be crazy! Never gonna happen. (Wide)