Critical Week: Take a break

Tube strikes have paralysed London this week, so the only films I've seen are those I could watch on links at home. I braved the bus one day to get to the theatre, a grisly journey involving flustered crowds, pouring rain and nightmarish traffic. But there were plenty of movies to watch. Paul Mescal and Josh O'Connor star in the understated romantic drama The History of Sound, which requires patience but has a lot to say. Denzel Washington reteams with Spike Lee for Highest 2 Lowest, a provocative thriller with a moral dilemma at its heart, reimagined from a Kurosawa classic.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Islands • Spinal Tap II
The History of Sound • Dreams
ALL REVIEWS >

Screening at Toronto Film Festival, Christy is a biopic about boxing champion Christy Martin. It's the usual story, but Sydney Sweeney is excellent in the title role. Michael Chiklis goes back to college in The Senior, based on the relentlessly inspirational true story of a 59-year-old who returns to play college football. The superb Adam Bessa stars in Ghost Trail, a complex, powerfully moving story about Syrian refugees in Europe. And the Hong Kong remake of Richard Linklater's 2001 drama Tape is seriously riveting exploration of perspective and memory.

I also attended the stage show Murmuration: Level 2, a mesmerising mix of music and movement. And I published my September TV Roundup featuring Chief of War, Wednesday, Smoke and much more.

Films screening this coming week include Harris Dickinson's Urchin, Marion Cotillard in The Ice Tower, Cillian Murphy in Steve, Mike Figgis' making-of documentary Megadoc and three festival favourites: The Love That Remains from Iceland, Two Prosecutors from Ukraine and Romeria from Spain.

Critical Week: A family portrait

Three big sequels were screened this week for the press. The big one was the world premiere of Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale, attended by most of the cast and crew. The film is a worthy farewell to this franchise, and there are no surprises. Which makes it even more cosy and comforting. A lot more fun was Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, continuing the hilarious mock-doc comedy antics of the world's favourite fake British heavy metal band. And then there were Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga back for one more time as the ghostbusting Warrens in The Conjuring: Last Rites, which works best when it centres on the characters rather than the rather silly ghostly creep-out.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
On Swift Horses • Christy
Night of the Juggler
ALL REVIEWS >

We also had Benedict Cumberbatch in The Thing With Feathers, an artful exploration of grief that really gets under the skin. Cooper Hoffman leads The Long Walk, based on a Stephen King novel set in a 1970s American dystopia. It's very dark, but also compelling and thought-provoking. The horror thriller Good Boy skilfully unfolds through a dog's-eye-view, which makes it unusual enough to catch us off guard. And the British drama Brides addresses a very thorny issue with engaging characters and a sharp sense of youthful hope.

There are fewer screenings this coming week, largely due to the week-long Tube strikes, but among films I'll be watching are Emma Thompson in Dead of Winter, Michael Chiklis in The Senior, Adam Bessa in Ghost Trail and Justin Kurzel's Warren Ellis doc Ellis Park.

LFF 10: Close with a bang

And that's it. The 60th BFI London Film Festival came to a close tonight with the red carpet UK premiere of Ben Wheatley's Free Fire. Most of the cast were on hand (that's Sharlto Copley, Armie Hammer, Michael Smiley, Enzo Cilenti, Jack Reynor and Cillian Murphy, above), and I'm sure the party was a lot of fun. Not that I'd know: in the 19 years I've been covering the LFF I have never been invited to a festival party. But never mind - it's about the films for me, and here are some final highlights from Sunday...

Free Fire
dir Ben Wheatley; with Brie Larson, Sharlto Copley 16/UK ***.
With a bracingly simple premise and a screen full of hilariously quirky characters, Ben Wheatley plays a jazz riff on Tarantino in this riotous shoot-em-up. The plot may be under-defined and only barely developed, but the actors are having so much fun adding various shades of comedy and intensity to their roles that they keep the audience chuckling from start to finish.

Mascots
dir Christopher Guest; with Jane Lynch, Ed Begley Jr 16/US ***.
Using his improvisational mock-doc style, Christopher Guest takes on the world of sports mascotery. As in films like Best in Show and A Mighty Wind, Guest's gifted ensemble provides a constant flow of verbal and visual gags, playing up the wackier aspects of this subculture. There's nothing particularly new here, no innovation to the format, but the movie is consistently hilarious.

The Salesman
dir-scr Asghar Farhadi; with Shahab Hosseini, Taraneh Alidoosti 16/Irn ****
Here's yet another almost overpoweringly perceptive everyday drama from Asghar Farhadi, putting a normal couple through a series of events that push them to the breaking point. The plot centres on unexpected conflicts that provide challenging comments on both morality and forgiveness. This is a subtle, personal film that holds the audience in its grip, unable to work out where it might be going next.

The Last Laugh 
dir Ferne Pearlstein; with Mel Brooks, Sarah Silverman 16/US ****
Like The Aristocrats, this documentary explores the boundaries of what's appropriate in comedy. The specific topic here is when it's OK to crack a joke about a tragic event, specifically something as big and horrific as the Holocaust. What makes the film worth a look is how director Ferne Pearlstein strikes such a remarkable balance between the views of comics and survivors.

And finally, another film I saw in Venice was the Golden Lion winner The Woman Who Left, the riveting, nearly 4-hour drama by Lav Diaz. It was a last-minute addition to the London programme.