Donald Clarkemuses on a cruel month for movies

Here's a question for the trivia buffs. Which film holds the record for the most lucrative opening weekend in the US during October? I'll give you a clue: the movie in question was released in 2003. Well, The Return of the Kingdidn't come out until close to Christmas, so it can't be that. The first Pirates of the Caribbeanadventure was a summer flick.

Give up? The bizarre, terrifying - though far from hilarious - answer is Scary Movie 3.

To put this in perspective, David Zucker's farce, despite establishing that record, ended up as only the 22nd most successful film of 2003. Scary, indeed.

"April is the cruellest month," said TS Eliot. Which only goes to show that the great poet didn't spend much time at the multiplex in the weeks leading up to Halloween. Good grief, Tom. The manure Hollywood shovels out in October is fit only for a hollow man, his "headpiece filled with straw". (I went to university, you know.)

Just look at the mainstream releases to come our way this month. Eagle Eyeis crazy. How to Lose Friends & Alienate Peopleis a mess. The latest film in the terrifyingly successful High School Musicalfranchise will surely break Scary Movie 3'srecord, but you wouldn't exactly call that a prestige picture. The industry still views The Coen brothers' ribald Burn After Readingas an eccentric folly for eggheads. Of the popcorn releases, only Ghost Town, a truly splendid romantic comedy starring Ricky Gervais, is worth crossing the road to see, and that took hardly anything at the US box office.

In the US, February is, arguably, an even more wretched season for new releases. But as Valentine's Day looms in Europe, we are still catching up with those supposedly worthy films that, to qualify for the Oscars, the studios have released in Los Angeles before Christmas. So, if nothing else, we at least get to see Meryl Streep playing a Ukranian speech therapist or (this time, please God!) Jim Carrey essaying a mentally disabled cellist.

There's no way around it. The leafy space that lies between summer and Christmas - or, if you prefer, the new Bond flick - has become the year's cinematic dumping ground. Quick. Nobody's looking. Let's just plonk the rotting corpse of Nights in Rodantheon this lonely hillock and sneak off unnoticed.

And yet. When Jerry Bruckheimer closes a door, he somewhere opens a window. In recent years, distributors of independent films have noticed the October lull and, happy to avoid being overshadowed by Pirates or Batmen, have rolled out some of their finest releases of the year. There may be no decent superhero flicks this month, but you can catch the superb Gommorahand, on the 31st, a serious contender for the best film of the year. No month that sees the release of Hunger, Steve McQueen's shattering study of Bobby Sands's last days, can be all bad.

Maybe April is a tad crueller after all.