Critical Week: Off the rails

The best film screened this week was easily the Korean action horror Train to Busan, a nonstop thrill ride of a movie that keeps you holding on for dear life and screaming at the screen. And it has some properly serious subtext too. Honestly, I didn't think they made movies like this anymore! Alongside the current release of Under the Shadow, it's nice to see that there's life in the horror genre again.

Also this week, we had the lively, hilarious animated adventure Storks; the superbly well written and acted British comedy-drama Burn Burn Burn; the choppy, romantic Bollywood epic Mirzya; the meandering experimental Spanish drama The Ways of Man; and the hugely affirming narrative documentary Life, Animated, offering a new angle on autism.

Also, the 24th Raindance Film Festival came to a close over the weekend. I saw two more features: the harrowing trafficking drama Selling Isobel and the moving Holocaust documentary Trezoros. And I spent an hour experimenting with virtual reality in the festival's whizzy VR Arcade - clearly a glimpse of the future, but filmmakers still need to seize the narrative possibilities.

This coming week I have the Da Vinci Code sequel Inferno, Ken Loach's Cannes-winner I, Daniel Blake, the British drama Starfish and about 25 films I'll be watching just in the next week for the London Film Festival. Daily blog updates start Thursday...