Critical Week: Fairy dust

London finally enjoyed a late-summer heatwave this past week - not baking hot, but sunny skies and warm weather lured what looked like everyone out into the city. That'll likely have a knock-on effect on cinema box office if it continues through this weekend. Otherwise, things have been a bit quite for critics, as the Venice Film Festival continues and Toronto Film Festival kicks off. The programme for October's 65th London Film Festival was launched this week, and there are several bit titles from Venice, Toronto and Cannes in there. Meanwhile, here in London I caught up with two high-profile Amazon releases: Camila Cabello makes a strong acting debut in Cinderella, a musical comedy that's silly but entertaining. And Justice Smith gives a welcome grown-up performance in The Voyeurs, which starts as a Hitchcockian thriller but contrives itself into something unnervingly bleak.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
The Servant • Respect • Boy Meets Boy
The Collini Case • The Capote Tapes
ALL REVIEWS >

Smaller films includes Small Engine Repair, John Pollono's adaptation of his own play about three men on a mystery mission that swerves from edgy comedy to pitch-black thriller; Dating & New York is a twinkly romantic comedy about millennials trying not to fall in love (no surprise what happens); Iceland Is Best is a quirky and strangely muted British-made, Iceland-set comedy about teens with dreams; Death Drop Gorgeous is a messy but rather hilariously grisly slasher comedy set in a drag club; and The Collini Case is an excellent German courtroom drama that uses a fictional story to explore a shockingly true situation.

Coming up this next week, I'll be watching the filmed stage musical Come From Away, British drama A Brixton Tale, British comedy Pirates, horror thriller The Djinn, social media satire The Influencer, Norwegian comedy Ninjababy, Second World War drama Natural Light and Bruce LaBruce's Saint-Narcisse.