Critical Week: Fun in the sun

The sunshine finally emerged in London this week, which won't bode well for this week's box office as everyone takes advantage of the weather. It's also not great for film critics who spend more time than most in darkened basement screening rooms. At least one of the films this week was bright and summery: Two Tickets to Greece is a French road trip movie about two old friends island hopping in the Cyclades. It's watchable because of stars Laure Calamy and Olivia Cote (above), plus the always incandescent Kristin Scott Thomas. There was also this week's blockbuster Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, which has markedly upped the impressive digital effects and performance-capture work, but feels more formulaic than the previous trilogy.

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Less flashy was the British drama The Almond and the Seahorse, which features Rebel Wilson in a rare serious role in a story about the repercussions of brain injury. The Image of You is a feverishly trashy thriller with Sacha Pieterse and Parker Young, a proper guilty pleasure. Lazareth is a gripping but somewhat overserious post-apocalyptic thriller with Ashley Judd. Hazard is a raucous action comedy from Poland, an enjoyably messy guilty pleasure with an emotional core, And Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In is a fiercely impressive action thriller from Hong Kong with a vivid narrative and fabulous characters. I also caught rather bonkers and thoroughly crowd-pleasing The Opera Locos at the Peacock theatre.

This coming week I'll be watching Ryan Reynolds in IF, Chris Pratt in The Garfield Movie, Daisy Ridley in Young Woman and the Sea, Lena Dunham in Treasure, Elizabeth Hurley in Strictly Confidential and the horror thriller In Flames. I'mm also watch Dave Hill's stand-up show Caveman in a Spaceship.

Critical Week: Up in the air

It's been a nice quiet week following the end of the London Film Festival, with only a few screenings. The Eagle Huntress is a gripping, inspiring narrative documentary that was in the LFF, but I'd missed it. It's a stunningly shot story about a 13-year-old girl in Mongolia who takes on a man's world. By contrast, the dopey teen comedy Good Kids wastes its fresh cast with a script that pretends to be a gross-out romp but turns out to be prudish and corny.

There were also three independent dramas. Lazy Eye is a thoughtful, moving story of old lovers trying to reconnect, set in picturesque Joshua Tree, California. And there were the concluding two parts of a trilogy: made in 2013, The Falls: Testament of Faith never had a UK release, so I watched it to catch up on the events following the 2012 original before seeing this year's finale The Falls: Covenant of Grace. A bit over-serious but smart, honest and moving, the three films tell a story that explores the difficult balance between sexuality and religion (the lead characters are Mormons).

This coming week, the big movie is, obviously, Marvel's Doctor Strange starring Benedict Cumberbatch. We also have Idris Elba in 100 Streets, Spike Lee's Chi-Raq, the horror romp The Darkest Dawn, the military drama Burning Blue and Werner Herzog's internet doc Lo and Behold. Plus I have a bit of fringe theatre to take my mind off the cinema this weekend.