Critical Week: Just act natural

It's been another hot week in London, with a heatwave arriving just in time for the weekend. Again. Thankfully, screening rooms are nicely cooled. Films I caught up with this week include the action comedy The Spy Who Dumped Me, a genuinely hilarious romp anchored by Mila Kunis and the riotous Kate McKinnon. With its UK release delayed by the World Cup, Ant-Man and the Wasp was finally screened, and it's a lot of fun. Although it's nothing we didn't expect. And one to watch is the Japanese anime Mirai, a gorgeous, family-friendly story that's bound to cross boundaries.

Off the beaten path, we had the Portuguese arthouse drama The Forest of the Lost Souls, a cleverly twisty story about mortality that shifts into a slasher horror. From Italy, Sicilian Ghost Story is a sumptuously inventive take on a true story, told through the eyes of two pre-teens whose sweet romance is interrupted by a mafia kidnapping. The micro-budget American drama Brotherly Love bravely tackles the issue of homosexuality through the eyes of a young man training for the priesthood. And The Eyes of Orson Welles is a treat for movie fans, a love letter from British archivist Mark Cousins to one of the last century's most iconic filmmakers.

Coming up this next week, screenings include Jason Statham vs a giant shark in The Meg, Spike Lee's acclaimed BlacKkKlansman, Michael Jai White in the thriller Making a Killing, the British animation Sgt Stubby, the British canal-boat drama Tides, the Icelandic comedy Under the Tree, and the Elvis/America doc The King.

Critical Week: You better not pout

It seems rather early, but the holidays kicked off this week with the first festive movie, A Bad Moms Christmas, a sequel to last year's sweetly gross-out comedy with added grandmothers. More of the same, it's kind of the definition of mindless entertainment. There was also a press screening for Paddington 2, which might actually be better than the wonderful original film. It's a pure delight, a great story with superb characters and a range of silly, surreal and razor-sharp comedy.

And I can't remember the last time I was invited to attend a premiere, but tonight I was at the Royal Albert Hall for the world premiere of Kenneth Branagh's remake of the Agatha Christie classic Murder on the Orient Express. It's a big, classy whodunit with a nice mix of comedy and emotion stirred in to add weight to the characters. The entire cast was at the premiere, including Branagh, Judi Dench, Johnny Depp, Michelle Pfeiffer, Penelope Cruz, Daisy Ridley, Olivia Colman, Josh Gad, Willem Dafoe and Derek Jacobi.

There was also a spin on the zombie genre with the raucous office block black comedy Mayhem, as well as the remarkably straight-faced B-movie style bigfoot thriller Sightings. Plus two foreign films: the involving, mesmerising thriller Thelma from Norway and the movingly personal drama Santa and Andres from Cuba. And two docs: 78/52 gets into lots of enjoyable detail about how Hitchcock created that iconic shower scene, while The Freedom to Marry explores the activists at the centre of the Supreme Court's decision on marriage equality.

This coming week we have screenings of Josh Brolin in Only the Brave, Colin Firth in The Mercy, Richard Gere in The Dinner, Jon Bernthal in Sweet Virginia, Lee Pace in Revolt and Virginia Madsen in Better Watch Out.

Critical Week: Hit the road...

It's been a very busy week, screening-wise. Easily the best film, and one of my favourites of the year so far, was Kubo and the Two Strings, the animated adventure set in a mythical Japan. It's a stunning mix of stop-motion and live action, but the story and characters make it unmissable. The week's other animated offering was Seth Rogen's rude comedy Sausage Party, but the cinema had a power cut 10 minutes into the press screening, so I'll be unable to review it (some might say I had a lucky escape).

Back in live action, we had the all-star ensemble adult comedy Bad Moms, which is better than it looks. The story is silly, but the cast and script are hilarious. Anthropoid is a true story from WWII Prague told with a bracing attention to realistic detail, anchored by solid turns from Cillian Murphy and Jamie Dornan. Daniel Radcliffe plays a corpse in Swiss Army Man, a survivalist comedy also starring Paul Dano. It's perhap of the oddest movies of the year, but has a certain charm. Andy Samberg brings his ex-boyband sketch character to the big screen for the constantly funny pastiche doc Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping. And the doc The Beatles: Eight Days a Week - The Touring Years takes a somewhat easy approach to the subject matter, but holds the audience with unseen footage, big personalities and great music.

But there was more! Genre films included Blair Witch, a 17-years-later sequel to the game-changing found footage hit. The rather nutty action thriller Kickboxer: Vengeance shifts Jean-Claude Van Damme to the mentor role for new Muay Thai expert Alain Moussi. The gentle British comedy ChickLit has some fun with the mummy porn phenomenon. The skilfully madeAustralian drama Downriver is deeply haunting, as is Pablo Trapero's stunning drama The Clan, about a real-life 1980s crime family in Buenos Aires. And then there's the Mexican shocker We Are the Flesh, an outrageously in-your-face post-apocalyptic freak-out. And Hell Town goes for more comical chills with its witty pastiche horror-soap TV format.

This coming week I'm heading to Italy for the 73rd Venice International Film Festival. It's my first time at the festival, and in Venice for that matter. So I'm looking forward to exploring the city as well as seeing some amazing movies. Films on the programme include new work from Denis Villeneuve, Tom Ford, Terrence Malick, Damien Chazelle, Derek Cianfrance, Wim Wenders, Pablo Larrain, Francois Ozon, Paolo Sorrentino, Antoine Fuqua and Ana Lily Amirpour. Stars expected on the red carpet include Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Alicia Vikander, Chris Pratt, Michael Fassbender, Jake Gyllenhaal, Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Denzel Washington, Diane Keaton, Jeremy Renner, Jude Law, Mel Gibson, Keanu Reeves, JK Simmons and Dakota Fanning. Of course, I'll be covering it all right here...

Critical Week: Digging deep

London critics had a chance to catch up with Jennifer Aniston's acclaimed performance in Cake this week - a moving film about pain and grief. The script is sometimes obvious, but the acting and filmmaking are raw and sensitive. Aniston's work is definitely worthy of Oscar attention - but competition is brutal! For contrast we also had the sci-fi action blockbuster Jupiter Ascending, starring Mila Kunis and Channing Tatum - a lively, seriously eye-catching romp that's a lot of fun of you don't try to make sense of it. Like most of the Wachowskis' work, its reputation is likely to grow as time goes on.

This rather busy week also featured screenings of: Miles Teller and Analeigh Tipton in the contrived but watchable rom-com Two Night Stand, Bernard Rose's nutty period biopic-thriller The Devil's Violinist, the inventively head-spinning spacial-rift thriller Coherence, the awkwardly trashy horror comedy Suburban Gothic, the not-very-likeable British black comedy Down Dog, the cleverly artistic horror remake/sequel The Town that Dreaded Sundown, Viggo Mortensen in the Argentine wilderness in the surreal gem Jauja, the gorgeous Oscar-nominated animated epic The Tale of the Princess Kaguya and the pointed, surprising documentary The Overnighters. Whew!

This coming week's screenings include: the sci-fi action Robot Overlords, the acclaimed Ukrainian doc The Tribe, the Cold War doc The Man Who Saved the World, and I'll also get to see Ridley Scott's Blade Runner: The Final Cut on a big screen for the first time. Sunday night is also Bafta night - perhaps the best predictor of what will happen on Oscar night, as the voters overlap heavily. Expect lots of stars on the red carpet, and some surprise winners.

Critical Week: Into the woods

The most anticipated press screening this past week was The Place Beyond the Pines, a moody three-part drama starring Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper that's beautifully filmed and acted. It certainly leaves us with more to think about than the colourful Disney adventure Oz the Great and Powerful, which has fantastic 3D and a strong cast led by James Franco, Michelle Williams, Rachel Weisz and Mila Kunis, but feels both too family friendly and over-reliant on digital flashiness. We also caught up with Fire With Fire, a contrived but watchable thriller with Bruce Willis and Josh Duhamel; the lushly photographed French double-biopic Renoir, an intriguing film about both the painter father and filmmaker son; and the Icelandic true-life adventure The Deep, an astonishing story of survival that's intriguingly (and slightly dully) told without any manipulative moviemaking.

I also continued to preview films from the upcoming 27th BFI London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival (14-24 March). There was more James Franco - both on-screen and as codirector this time - with the seriously clever arthouse oddity Interior. Leather Bar., recreating 40 censored minutes from Al Pacino's 1980 thriller Cruising; rising stars Juno Temple and Riley Keough in the mopey romance Jack & Diane; the powerfully moving Iranian drama Facing Mirrors (my best of the fest so far); the provocative, intense Israeli drama Out in the Dark; the engaging, startlingly honest retiree documentary Les Invisibles; an eye-opening doc about female-to-male transexual pornstar Mr Angel; the artful Swedish kaleidoscopic doc She Male Snails; and the intensely powerful activism doc United in Anger.

This coming week, I've got still more James Franco in the crime comedy Spring Breakers, Steve Coogan in the Soho property tycoon biopic The Look of Love, Steve Carell as The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, the animated prehistoric comedy-adventure The Croods and the Spanish drama The Sex of the Angels.