I have a proposal for the officials of the Academy. How about we move Oscar season from the cold, dreary dead of winter to the more intrinsically cheerful season of summer? That way, when we walk out of the year’s most masterful but also most depressing films, there would at least be warmth and sunlight to restore our spirits. Or perhaps we could require that every award season include at least one Slumdog

Millionaire. A certain percentage of screen time would have to be devoted to beautiful people dancing, or something equally cheery, to counter the poverty, abuse, and other misery required to make a great fi lm.

I had some hope that Precious might fill that spot this year. It certainly had poverty and abuse, and some reviews described the film as uplifting. Like Slumdog, Precious tells the story of a promising young person

growing up in abject poverty (a girl in 1980s Harlem this time). But her loved ones are vastly more evil than those in Slumdog (comedian Mo’nique seems likely to win awards for her convincing portrayal of the

worst mother I’ve ever seen) and her golden opportunity is a GED, not a million dollars. The film, although very well written,directed, and acted, certainly didn’t lift me anywhere. My primary response was queasiness (even though the characters’ binge eating and morbid obesity had scared me off my popcorn early). It felt wrong to be watching such degradation for entertainment, even if Oprah says we should—she was a producer and heavy promoter of the film. Misery is presented far more entertainingly in A Single Man and Up in the Air. The source of unhappiness for these characters—both wealthy white men—is more existential. In A Single Man, Colin Firth plays an older, gay Englishman who teaches at a university in L.A. and has recently lost his partner in an auto accident. The film is set in the 1960s and directed by clothing designer Tom Ford. As you would expect, the sets and wardrobes are entrancing. The score and the directing (especially long sequences of a body floating in water) are a bit heavy-handed. But melodrama is probably hard to avoid when you’re telling the story of a man whose loneliness has driven him to want to end his otherwise cushy life (and no, that’s not a spoiler). In contrast, George Clooney’s character in Up in the Air purports to enjoy his solitude. He is a consultant who travels the country, firing people for managers who don’t want to do the task themselves. When we meet him, he’s quite content as a very single

man, finding the warmth and satisfaction in frequent flyer miles that most people get from their families. As you might guess from the film’s inclusion on this list, that contentment does not quite hold up, although the film does, making it one of my absolute favorites of the year. George Clooney is at his

best, and the supporting actresses—as well as the actual unemployed people who play some of his “firees”—do great work. While I can’t offer any happy films to break up this morose navel-gazing, you can

at least get some variety by watching two movies about a more universally depressing topic—war. The Hurt Locker is the more typical war story of the two in that it actually takes place at the front. It’s about war on an individual scale, though, specifically the experiences of one bomb-disposal squad and

its leader, a man whose combined heroism and craziness makes you wonder if those traits are inextricably linked. The film should be required viewing for all elected officials. (The Hurt Locker came out earlier in the year, which may crimp its Oscar chances but allows it to already be available on DVD.)

The psychological damage of war is also the focus of The Messenger, which stars Woody Harrelson as a soldier who notifies the families of those killed in action. And yes, that job is exactly as much fun as it sounds. The movie, however, is captivating, occasionally funny, and of course, thought-provoking about

the horrors of war. It also proves that Woody has acting talents that weren’t fully exercised in his time as an idiot Boston bartender. You may, however, want to close out your Oscar viewing with some reruns of

Cheers, just to remind yourself that there is a place where everyone knows your name (take that, you Best/Loneliest Actor contenders) and some problems can be resolved in under half an hour.