Critical Week: Let's hear it for the boy

There were a few big press screenings this past week here in London, but none were so surprisingly enjoyable as Craig Brewer's remake of the 1984 dance hit Footloose, which won us over with sheer skill and energy. We also enjoyed Steven Soderbergh's brainy all-star epidemic blockbuster Contagion, Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the cancer comedy-drama 50/50, and Andrea Arnold's astonishingly visceral (and award-winning) adaptation of Wuthering Heights.

A bit less enjoyable was the Sarah Jessica Parker comedy I Don't Know How She Does It, which was watchable but also forgettable. We also had Hugh Jackman in the redemptive robot-boxing romp Real Steel. I loved the deeply disturbing documentary The Green Wave, about the crushed 2009 street demonstrations in Iran. And I also enjoyed the six films I saw in press screenings for the Raindance Film Festival, which starts next week - most were small independent British films.

This coming week, screenings include Killer Elite, the rather intriguing collision of Jason Statham, Clive Owen and Robert DeNiro; Taylor Lautner in the thriller Abduction; The Three Musketeers, yet another 3D remake; Terence Davies' The Deep Blue Sea with Rachel Weisz; Morgan Freeman in Dolphin Tale; and the festival favourite Miss Bala. And just as Raindance begins, so too do press screenings for the 55th London Film Festival. When it rains it pours...