Critical Week: Shop til you drop

The 34th Raindance Film Fest kicked off Wednesday night with April X, an enjoyably stylised near-future thriller starring Luly Krug and Connor Storrie. Indie films from around the world are on the programme over the next 10 days. Meanwhile, the biggest film in cinemas is Toy Story 5, the latest thoroughly entertaining sequel in the franchise that could easily have just ended years ago. Thankfully, the Pixar team doesn't rest on its laurels.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Cactus Pears • Toy Story 5
Rose of Nevada • Nino
Virginia Woolf's Night & Day
PERHAPS AVOID:
A Murder Between Friends
ALL REVIEWS >

I also saw Voicemails for Isabelle, a romcom that references classic romcoms shamelessly and still wins us over thanks to charming leads Zoey Deutch and Nick Robinson. Virginia Woolf's Night and Day is a smart British period comedy-drama with Haley Bennett as a fiercely independent woman in 1910 London, Joan Collins leads the cast of the nutty whodunit A Murder Between Friends, which is watchable even if it's very corny. The British drama Ish is a staggeringly realistic slice of life that grapples meaningfully with big issues. And the American drama Blue Film is a fascinating and finely contained exploration of attraction and sexuality.

Coming up this next week, I'll be watching Milly Alcock in Supergirl and the Icelandic vampire movie Thirst. At Raindance Film Festival, I plan to see Think of England, Pescador, My Daughter's Hair and more, and then at Annecy Festival in France there's Minions & Monsters to start with.

Critical Week: I feel pretty

While all eyes continue to be on Los Angeles as the extent of the fire damage becomes even more horrifically clear, the film industry here in London continues relatively as normal. Bafta announced their film awards nominations on Wednesday, the usual expected lists with idiosyncratic touches here and there. And among screenings this week, Michelle Yeoh popped in (on great form) for a lively Q&A at a press screening for Star Trek: Section 31, which spins her Discovery character Philippa Georgiou off for her own action-comedy mayhem. It will be interesting to see how franchise fans take on the film's riotous tone.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
I'm Still Here • The Writer
A Complete Unknown
ALL REVIEWS >

There was also a late screening of Leigh Whannell's latest reworking of a monster classic: Wolf Man. Stars Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner make the most of the emotional angles in the somewhat thin script, and the grisly suspense will keep fans entertained. Tom Hanks and Robin Wright reunite with Robert Zemeckis for Here, a gimmicky experimental film that places a camera in one place for millions of years. The effects and imagery is impressive, but the mini-melodramas feel arch. From Lithuania, the New York-set drama The Writer features just two actors as they talk over the course of one afternoon, and it's properly gripping stuff, taking on big issues and quietly intimate emotion. Finally there was Charlie Shackleton's Zodiac Killer Project, documenting the film he never got to make. It's witty and inventive, and premieres at Sundance.

This coming week, among the films I'll be watching are Steven Soderbergh's Presence, the Irish drama Four Mothers, the musician doc Luther: Never Too Much and a restored screening of Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock, which I've never seen projected.

Critical Week: Movie night

With the sunshine blazing across Great Britain, cinema box office is likely to take a hit these days. Although maybe the air conditioning will lure people to escape from the heat. I've certainly enjoyed attending press screenings this week, a cool break from the sweaty sunshine. I caught up with Pixar's new animated feature Elemental, which premiered at Cannes. It's a little uneven plotwise, but the characters are terrific and it looks spectacular. And then there's the return of Chris Hemsworth in Extraction II, an even more confident thrill-ride. It's ripping entertainment, but very violent.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
You Can Live Forever • The Flash
Elemental • Extraction II
ALL REVIEWS >

Also at Cannes, Wes Anderson's new slice of whimsy is Asteroid City, in which a vast ensemble of A-listers circle around strange goings on in a desert crater. It's quirky and has moments of genius, but little resonance. Take That's songs were adapted into the British stage musical The Band, which has now become the comedy romp Greatest Days. But the laughs are undermined by several pushy dark plot points.  And I also saw two smaller films centred around addicts: God's Petting You is an offbeat, messy heist comedy about a junkie who teams up with a sex addict to rob a pornstar, while Sunlight is a likeable but contrived Irish drama about an addict trying to have a final connection with his dying sponsor.

This next week I'll be watching Harrison Ford in action in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, British drama To Nowhere, French drama Mother & Son and two documentaries: Baato from the Himalayas in Nepal and The Last Rider about the 1989 Tour de France.

Critical Week: Feeling grinchy

As movies get increasingly heartwarming, it can be a challenge to ward off that inner Scrooge. Thankfully I have been watching quite a few more disturbing arthouse movies alongside the more warmly emotional wide-audience titles. And then there's A Man Called Otto, the engaging forthcoming Tom Hanks comedy that's a sentimental remake of the much edgier Swedish hit A Man Called Ove. Blockbuster sequel Avatar: The Way of Water also adds an undercurrent of emotion to its visually stunning action violence, as James Cameron creates another epic that entertains on various levels. 

BEST FILMS OUT NOW:
Rimini • The Silent Twins • Lynch/Oz
She Said • Matilda the Musical • Nanny
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
ALL REVIEWS >

More offbeat movies contending for awards included, appropriately, the UK's international film entry Winners, an enjoyable romp set about an Oscar statuette that takes its own mini-adventure in rural Iran. Ulrich Seidl's Rimini is a riveting pitch-black comedy about a desperate has-been singer in an off-season seaside resort town. Lukas Dhont's moving drama Close traces a pre-teen's harsh coming-of-age through the disruption of his relationship with his best friend. The hugely involving Polish odyssey EO follows a loveable donkey on an incredible journey that's sweet, challenging and often scary. And last year's crowd-pleasing Oscar nominee Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom is set in a gorgeous isolated corner of Bhutan. And outside awards contention were two indie titles: the Italian comedy-drama Marscapone, a warmly intimate look at maintaining your identity within a relationship, and American drama Peridot, an intriguingly loose portrait of a street hustler.

There are still a lot of movies to catch up with as year-end voting deadlines approach, including Will Smith in Emancipation, Lea Seydoux in One Find Morning, Toni Collette in The Estate, Christian Bale in The Pale Blue Eye, the animated adventure The Amazing Maurice, the war epic All Quiet on the Western Front and the David Bowie doc Moonage Daydream.

Critical Week: Taking care of business

It's been another eclectic week for press screenings, cut short here in Britain by a four-day weekend to celebrate the Queen's Platinum Jubilee: 70 years on the throne. But the movies just keep coming. The biggest screening was for Elvis, introduced in person by Baz Luhrmann, Tom Hanks, Austin Butler and various other actors and producers. I absolutely loved the film, as Luhrmann uses his hyper-lush approach to dig for deeper meaning in Elvis Presley's life story.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Fire Island • Men • Neptune Frost
Dashcam • Pickpocket • C.R.A.Z.Y.
ALL REVIEWS >

Also surprisingly deep, the romantic comedy Fire Island gives Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice a proper queer spin, and is notable for being unapologetic, hilarious and swoon-worthy. The animated feature The Bob's Burgers Movie is deadpan comical fun even for those unfamiliar with the TV show. And a bit further afield, the Indian drama Major recounts the true story of a hero of the 2008 Mumbai attack with sudsy melodrama and rah-rah patriotism, while the Rwandan musical fantasy Neptune Frost is so bracingly original that it gets deep under the skin even if its story is dreamy and enigmatic. And the shorts collection The Male Gaze: Fleeting Glances features seven sharply provocative films exploring awkward connections.

Everything gets much busier next week with Sundance Film Festival: London - I'm planning to see nine films there, and will cover them here as usual. The movies include Emma Thompson in I Love You, Leo Grande; Sterling K Brown in Honk For Jesus, Save Your Soul; Rebecca Hall in Resurrection; the British drama Brian and Charles; Finnish horror Hatching; volcanic documentary Fire of Love; and social justice doc Free Sol Choo Lee.

Critical Week: Joy to the world

Happy Christmas from locked-down London! I had a barrage of timed awards-consideration screening links this week that changed what I was planning to watch. This meant that I saw quite a few contenders, and the common adjective to describe highbrow movies this year seems to be: "dour". Thankfully, each has something to recommend in it, usually strong performances that lift the tone. And some of these films have been wonderfully upbeat too.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK: 

One Night in Miami • Soul 

Promising Young Woman 

News of the World • AK vs AK 

The Dissident • Luz 

ALL REVIEWS >

Hugh Bonneville stars in the Roald Dahl biopic To Olivia (above), a downbeat film that's beautifully played by its cast, including Keeley Hawes as Dahl's wife, the actress Patricia Neal. Tom Hanks gives yet another wonderful performance in Paul Greengrass' earthy Western News of the World, matched by a fierce turn from the wondrous Helena Zengel. Vanessa Kirby and Katherine Waterston yearn for each other in the aching period drama The World to Come. Jude Law and Carrie Coon find cracks in their high-flying life in the insidious 1980s drama The Nest. Sophia Loren shines brightly in the terrific Italian comedy-drama The Life Ahead. Diane Lane and Kevin Costner have a happy life in Let Him Go, until they really, really don't.

There were also a few guilty pleasures this week. Gerard Butler stars in the catastrophic comet strike thriller Greenland, which is far more entertaining than expected. Hilary Swank is downright nasty in Fatale, a dopey noir-style semi-erotic thriller. And Bollywood superstar Anil Kapoor takes on director Anurag Kashyap in the clever pastiche action comedy AK vs AK.

Indie movies included Steven Yeun leading a terrific ensemble in the acclaimed drama Minari, about a Korean family in Arkansas; Boaz Yakin's swirling gender-bending dance-infused drama Aviva; the naturalistic, finely observed immigrant drama Farewell Amor; and the fiercely artful surreal thriller The One You Feed. From Colombia, Luz: The Flower of Evil is a wonderfully stylised horror packed with bonkers touches. And there were two seriously intense documentaries: The Dissident traces the horrific assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudis in Turkey, while the thriller-style Welcome to Chechnya following activists trying to rescue young gay people hunted down in Russia.

I'm taking a few days off from movies around Christmas. Then I'll dive in and watch Judi Dench in a new all-star version of Blythe Spirit, Michelle Pfeiffer in French Exit, the comedy Freshman Year, the Greek drama Apples and the Italian documentary The Truffle Hunters. Others are bound to pop up before voting deadlines close in soon.

Critical Week: Under attack

There's been some tentative move to ease lockdown, but cinemas are still mainly showing old movies (The Empire Strikes Back is No 1 on the UK box office chart this week). I had my first meal in a restaurant since early March -- well outside it on a distanced table. But the weather has been gloomy, which is more suited for watching movies at home really....

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
The Sunlit Night • The Painted Bird
Palm Springs
PERHAPS AVOID:
Fatal Affair • Getting It • Divos!
FULL REVIEWS >

The biggest movie I saw this week was the gripping WWII thriller Greyhound, which no doubt would have looked better on a big screen. As always, Tom Hanks is solid as a captain shepherding a convoy of ships through a pack of Nazi submarines in the North Atlantic. Much better is the Andy Samberg comedy Palm Springs, a bit of time-loop madness that's both clever and surprisingly deep. By contrast, Fatal Affair is a simplistic and derivative thriller that wastes excellent actors like Nia Long and Omar Epps.

As for arthouse titles, The Sunlit Night is a very smart comedy-drama about a young American painter (Jenny Slate) working in Arctic Norway for a summer. It's quirky and involving. Carmilla is an atmospheric 19th century gothic freak-out based on a pre-Dracula vampire novel. It looks amazing. From Denmark, Dreambuilders boasts seriously impressive, ambitious animation and some great characters. But the goofy comedy Divos! never lives up to its promise, and Getting It has a solid story but works too hard to praise its writer-director-star. There were also two entertaining, offbeat docs: In Bright Axiom is about a playful secret society that sparks imagination and collaboration, while Superhuman: The Invisible Made Visible explores the untapped power of the mind's connection to, well, everything.

Films to watch this coming week include Elisabeth Moss in Shirley, Brenton Thwaites in Ghosts of War, Josh Hartnett in Most Wanted, underground boxing thriller American Fighter, horror movie Open 24 Hours and the Italian drama Piranhas.

London Film Fest: Be my neighbour

Well, the 63rd BFI London Film Festival is winding down now, with only one more day to go. Today was a complete washout, with rain all day long. And tomorrow looks similar, which will make the closing night red carpet a bit soggy for Martin Scorsese and Robert DeNiro and The Irishman. But then wet weather is better for selling movie tickets! I now have a serious backlog of reviews to write, so I'll start catching up on that next week. In the meantime, here are some more comments on things I've been watching...

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
dir Marielle Heller; with Tom Hanks, Matthew Rhys 19/US ****
There is a sliver of a Fred Rogers biopic in this warm drama, but director Marielle Heller makes it much more than that, telling a specific story that can't help but resonate even with viewers who have never seen his classic TV show. For those of us who grew up with it, the nostalgia is sometimes overpowering. But the film manages to be sentimental without the schmaltz. And it will speak to audiences on levels much deeper than the obvious themes.

Deerskin
dir-scr Quentin Dupieux; with Jean Dujardin, Adele Haenel 19/Fr ***.
Cheeky French filmmaker Quentin Dupieux comes up with another bonkers idea for a grisly thriller that is thoroughly infused with wry comical overtones. This one's about a jacket that announces that it wants to be the only jacket on earth. And it's brought to life with the help of ace costar Jean Dujardin. The movie is relentlessly ridiculous, but it also has enough heart to hold the viewer's sympathy, even as we laugh and cringe at the escalating body count.

Just Mercy
dir Destin Daniel Cretton; with Michael B Jordan, Jamie Foxx 19/US **.
This drama recounts powerful true events in a rather straightforward style. The writing and direction are so standard that it's possible to predict every single thing that happens in the story, including lines of dialog before they're spoken. It's a surprisingly unambitious movie from the talented filmmaker Destin Daniel Cretton. But cast members dive in to the roles with plenty of passion, creating a strong sense of tension in this story of real-life racial injustice.

Ordinary Love
dir Lisa Barros D'Sa, Glenn Leyburn; with Lesley Manville, Liam Neeson 19/UK ***.
Sensitive and honest, this quiet drama from Northern Ireland captures the earthy interaction between a couple as one of them goes through a round of cancer treatment. Thankfully, the film focusses on the people and their connection rather than the illness. It's a remarkably grounded, often downright matter-of-fact look at everyday life, with plenty of added detail in the writing and acting. So even if it's never revelatory, it's involving and moving.

Martin Eden
dir Pietro Marcello; with Luca Marinelli, Jessica Cressy 19/It ****
Taking an ambitious approach to adapting the Jack London novel, this Italian drama is an artful odyssey packed with political and artistic themes. Eerily timeless, the film references Italian movie classics as director Pietro Marcello playfully stirs in eclectic music and archival footage cutaways. As it encompasses the entire 20th century, there's also a strikingly 21st century finale that makes the story almost unnervingly current.

Invisible Life [A Vida Invisível de Eurídice Gusmão]
dir Karim Ainouz; with Carol Duarte, Julia Stockler 19/Br ****
Gorgeously filmed in rich, deep colours and infused with even stronger emotions, this Brazilian drama tells the epic story of a family connection with a narrative that spans nearly 70 years. This is a beautiful depiction of the lingering connections between siblings, parents, children and lifelong friends. And it's also a reminder that the expectations and assumptions we make about the people we love probably aren't very accurate or helpful.

Links:
Shadows LONDON FILM FEST homepage (full reviews will be linked here) 
Official LONDON FILM FEST site 

Critical week: He's behind you!

It's been a busy week catching up with movies here in London. The biggest films were entries in decades-old franchises. Child's Play is a reboot, rather than sequel, updated to the artificial-intelligence era and starring Aubrey Plaza. Toy Story 4 tells another superbly engaging story, again bringing these indelible characters together with action and emotion. And Men in Black International attempts a fresh turn in the saga, with younger stars Tessa Thompson and Chris Hemsworth, rather too much digital nuttiness and an only OK plot.

Three small-screen movies will be covered in another blog entry: Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler reunite for the dopey Europe-set comedy whodunit Murder Mystery, Randall Park and Ali Wong star in the snappy-silly rom-com Always Be My Maybe, and Matthew McConaughey plays to type as the stoner title character in the somewhat unfocussed comedy The Beach Bum (out this week on VOD).

As for more arthouse fare, there was Joanna Hogg's new film The Souvenir, another exploration of British upper-class repression, starring Tilda Swinton and her daughter Honor Swinton Byrne, plus Tom Burke. All are excellent, and the film is deeply chilling. Swinging Safari is a wild and woolly Aussie 1970s-set comedy starring Guy Pearce, Kylie Minogue and Radha Mitchell. It's a bit over-the-top and chaotic. The American-set British thriller Division 19 is set in a near-future society in which privacy is outlawed. It looks great but makes little sense. From South Africa, the musical Kanarie is a powerful exploration of bigotry and self-acceptance, as a young man goes through his mandatory military service as a member of a choir. From India, Unsaid is a dark drama about deep family secrets, powerfully well played. And the British documentary Are You Proud explores the Pride movement with an intriguingly critical eye.

Coming up this next week, we have Benedict Cumberbatch in The Current War, Alicia Vikander in Euphoria, Angus Macfadyen in Robert the Bruce, the Oscar-nominated drama Never Look Away, the French water polo comedy The Shiny Shrimps, the Indian drama Roobha, and the doc Southern Pride, among others....

Critical Week: The morning news

Awards season is heating up with a flurry of late screenings and screener discs before voting deadlines. Two sets of awards I vote in - London and online critics - have a nominations deadline on Friday 15th December, so there's a lot to see. Although there are so many documentaries this year that it's impossible to watch them all. Here's what I've watched in the past few days...

Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks are at the peak of their powers in The Post, Steven Spielberg's expertly made film about the release of Pentagon Papers in early-70s Washington DC. It's startlingly relevant. Christian Bale and Rosamund Pike are excellent in Hostiles, Scott Cooper's remarkably gritty, realistic Western. It beautifully tackles some huge issues. Claes Bang and Elisabeth Moss are terrific in the Cannes-winning Swedish black comedy The Square, which unapologetically takes on the art world. It's challenging and fiendishly clever.

Outside awards season, Better Watch Out is a riotously edgy pastiche that plays with cliches of both Christmas and horror movies to create something both entertaining and nasty. Native is an extremely low-key British sci-fi thriller about two officers on a deep space mission who question obedience to their leaders back home. And after seeing The Disaster Artist last week, I had to check out Tommy Wiseau's 2003 bad-classic The Room, which is every bit as terrible as they say, but also has a bizarre charm to it. Finally, there was this doc, which I watched so I could participate in a lively TV discussion programme...

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Whose Streets?
dir Sabaah Folayan; with Brittany Ferrell, Bassem Masri 17/US ***.
This documentary takes an intensely personal approach to the aftermath of the shooting of unarmed teen Mike Brown Jr by police in Ferguson, Missouri, in August 2014. Using firsthand interviews and extensive video footage of the events, it traces how the vigil turned into a peaceful march and then an activist movement demanding an end to racially charged policing. And also how this was met with a heavy-handed official response with heavily armed cops in militarised tanks. It's definitely not a one-sided film, condemning the looting and vandalism as well as how the media and police focus on that, ignoring the name of the victim. The springboard is Martin Luther King's statement that "a riot is the language of the unheard". Without ever getting shouty, the film is raw and angry. Although it gets a little bogged down in personal stories. These may be resonant, but they feel a bit off-topic. And as it follows years of investigations, riots, vigils and arrests, it also gets a little repetitive. Which is exactly the point.

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This coming week we have the hotly anticipated screening of Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, plus Dwayne Johnson in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, British drama Beast, Hungarian drama Jupiter's Moon, Brazilian drama Bingo: The King of the Mornings and the short film collection Boys on Film 17: Love Is the Drug.

LFF 7: Can't take it anymore

The 60th London Film Festival is charging into its final weekend with a flurry of events and premieres. The red carpets outside the various venues are getting a workout, while the press screenings at Picturehouse Central are packed to overflowing. Here are some highlights from Wednesday and Thursday...

The Rehearsal
dir Alison Maclean; with James Rolleston, Kerry Fox 16/NZ ***.
A clever riff on acting, this drama from New Zealand is packed with terrific actors in complex roles. So even if the bare-boned plot gets a little pushy at times, at least the interaction has a raw honesty to it, exploring some enormous themes through the prism of art. Filmmaker Alison Maclean also injects plenty of jagged humour and understated emotion into the story, which makes it hugely engaging even if the pacing is a little slack.

The Ghoul
dir-scr Gareth Tunley; with Tom Meeten, Dan Skinner 16/UK ****
Moody and riveting, this dark British thriller takes the audience on a surreal journey into the human psyche. It's playful and surprising, with a style clearly inspired by David Lynch as it taps into emotions that the audience might not fully grasp. But we feel it all.

There were also a few films I saw at other festivals. From Venice, three female led dramas: Dakota Fanning and Kit Harington (pictured) in the edgy Western Brimstone, Alice Lowe in the fiendishly clever serial killer comedy Prevenge (pictured at the top), Natalie Portman in the offbeat period drama Planetarium. And from BFI Flare: Russell Tovey in the complex, intriguing football drama The Pass.

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C R I T I C A L   W E E K
Along with LFF movies, I've also had to keep up with the regular releases in cinemas. This week's screenings included a double dose of Tom Hanks: the lacklustre second Da Vinci Code sequel Inferno and the strikingly edgy, well-made Sully, about the amazing real-life landing of a passenger jet in the Hudson River in 2009. And then there was Tom Cruise in the thriller sequel Jack Reacher: Never Go Back. Plus a couple of punchy British dramas: Ken Loach's Palme d'Or winner I, Daniel Blake, a powerful, uplifting drama about taking on bureaucracy; and Starfish, the dark but moving true story of a man who survived sepsis then struggled to rebuild his life.

Critical Week: A message from the desert

UK critics this week had an enjoyable press screening for Tom Hanks' new comedy-drama A Hologram for the King, complete with themed cuisine. And the film was enjoyable too - elusive and provocative. We also got to see Ricky Gervais' Netflix movie Special Correspondents on a big screen, and we laughed a lot more than some grumpy America critics did (perhaps because the film isn't very nice about the American media). And then there was the multi-strand ensemble drama Mothers and Daughters, a gentle series of interlinked stories livened up by an all-star cast and some nice observations.

Further afield, the Australian pre-apocalypse drama These Final Hours avoids thrills for a deeper, more emotional approach. Michael Moore's latest documentary Where to Invade Next is entertaining and very, very pointed as it looks at things Europe has done better than America has. And we also had the final chapter in Miguel Gomes' epic trilogy about Portuguese politics, the beautifully made and surprisingly moving Arabian Nights: The Enchanted One.

Screenings coming up this week include Zac Efron and Seth Rogen reuniting for Bad Neighbours 2 (aka Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising), the animated adventure The Angry Birds Movie, Ethan Hawke in Born to Be Blue, Penelope Cruz in Ma Ma and two docs: Author: The JT Leroy Story about the literary scam and The First Monday in May about the Met Gala.

Critical Week: One last shot

Yes, UK critics saw another of the year's most anticipated films this week, the final instalment in the franchise: The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2. The A-list cast and Suzanne Collins' terrific source material continue to make this a superior series, with a epic-sized conclusion that's packed with strongly emotional moments in between the action mayhem. Jennifer Lawrence's usual costar Bradley Cooper leads the cast of the super-chef drama Burnt, which never quite sells either the story or the too-fancy food, but it's watchable enough.

Also this past week, we had a look at two prestige films going for awards-season attention: Tom McCarthy's Spotlight is a superb investigative drama about a news team (led byMark Ruffalo and Michael Keaton) looking into Boston's abusive priest scandal; Steven Spielberg's Bridge of Spies is a stately period thriller starring Tom Hanks as a negotiator navigating the tricky waters of Cold War Berlin.

At the other end of the spectrum, the nonsensical South African action movie Momentum stars a plucky Olga Kurylenko being chased by a scene-chomping James Purefoy. Somewhere in the middle, The Queen of Ireland is a fabulous, inspiring doc about Rory O'Neill and his iconic drag alter ego Panti Bliss; and the earthy, honest Mexican drama Velociraptor centres on two teens exploring their sexuality as the world is about to end.

I'll be in America over the next two weeks, so hope to catch up with several things that are out there but haven't screened here, including The Peanuts Movie, The 33, By the Sea, Love the Coopers and Secret in Their Eyes. We'll see how that goes! Watch this space...

LFF 11: That's a wrap

And so the 57th London Film Festival comes to a close with the world premiere of Saving Mr Banks, attended by Colin Farrell, Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks and Ruth Wilson - who earlier in the day gave one of the more hilarious press conferences I've attended. 

The festival was an odd one this year: it's just as un-festive as always, but there was controversy as this year for the first time they charged journalists a whopping £36 for accreditation (especially painful for freelancers, as it comes out of our pay) without giving us anything more. There weren't even goodie bags this year, for the first time in the 18 years I have covered this festival. But then this isn't a proper premiere festival; aside from tonight's closing film, there were no major world premieres. Instead, this is a catch-up event, presenting the best of the past year's festivals, including the winners of Berlin, Cannes, Toronto and Venice. So it's a great programme for film fans who struggle to catch up with these high-profile arthouse titles. It'll certainly always be a highlight of my cinematic year, fee or no fee.

So here are three more highlights - including the closing film, the full list of award winners and my 10 favourite films of the festival (linked to reviews). I have a backlog of about 8 films this year that still need to be written up. That's not too bad actually...

Saving Mr Banks

dir John Lee Hancock; with Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks 13/UK ****

After veering dangerously close to becoming an overproduced slush-fest, this film digs deeper and draws us in. This is mainly thanks to a remarkably detailed script and especially sharp performances from Thompson and Hanks. Yes, the Disney spirit (and marketing machine) nearly swamps it, but the film remains lively, moving and thoroughly entertaining... FULL REVIEW >

Gare du Nord 

dir Claire Simon; with Nicole Garcia, Reda Kateb 13/Fr ***

As an exploration of the variety of life seen in a single railway station, this film has certain value for people-watchers. But its narrative strands are only barely developed, and it overstays its welcome when it tries to stir in some twisty plotting and magical realism... FULL REVIEW >

Luton 

dir Michalis Konstantatos; with Nicholas Vlachakis, Eleftheria Komi 13/GR ***.

Fans of Dogtooth, Attenberg and Alps will be intrigued by this similarly styled Greek drama, which is even more elusive than those relentlessly obtuse films. But patience is paid off as the seemingly unrelated scenes begin to coalesce into something that's genuinely horrific. And when it's over, the film leaves us pondering some pretty big issues... FULL REVIEW >

AWARD WINNERS

• Best Film: IDA
• Doc (Grierson Award): MY FATHERS, MY MOTHER AND ME
• First Feature (Sutherland Award):  ILO ILO
• British Newcomer:  Jonathan Asser (STARRED UP)
• BFI Fellowship: Christopher Lee

MY 10 BEST OF THE FEST

1. 12 YEARS A SLAVE
2. IDA
3. CAPTAIN PHILLIPS
4. BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOUR
5. STRANGER BY THE LAKE
6. THE EPIC OF EVEREST
7. LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON
8. GLORIA
9. INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
10. HELI

LFF 1: Aye aye, captain!

The 57th London Film Festival kicked off last night with the Leicester Square premiere of Captain Phillips, and star Tom Hanks braved the suddenly chilly evening with his wife Rita Wilson as well as director Paul Greengrass and a range of celebrities, from Tom Ford to Terry Gilliam. Tonight it was Sandra Bullock and Alfonso Cuaron's turn to present Gravity. Here are some highlights from the first day...

Captain Phillips
dir Paul Greengrass; with Tom Hanks, Barkhi Abdi 13/US *****
Coming straight from the headlines and adapted with a documentary-style attention to detail, this fiercely well-crafted thriller would be impossible to believe if it weren't true. And even though we know the end of the story, this film generates so much nerve-shredding suspense that we feel like we need to be debriefed afterwards... FULL REVIEW >

Gravity
dir Alfonso Cuaron; with Sandra Bullock, George Clooney 13/US ****
Cuaron takes us on a 91-minute thrill ride deploying cutting-edge cinema technology and a harrowing performance from Sandra Bullock to root us in our seats. So even if the plot is rather contrived, the film looks so amazing that we barely breathe as we're hurled here and there just on the cusp of Earth's atmosphere... [full review coming soon]

As I Lay Dying
dir James Franco; with James Franco, Tim Blake Nelson 13/US ***
For his first narrative feature as a director, Franco ambitiously adapts William Faulkner's notoriously grim novel. And what a surprise: the film is relentlessly downbeat, and pretty dull too. Franco may prove that he has a fresh visual eye, but the highly emotive story is oddly uninvolving... FULL REVIEW >

Jeune & Jolie
dir Francois Ozon; with Marine Vacth, Geraldine Pailhas 13/Fr ****
Ozon explores a transgressive side of sexuality in this internalised drama about a teen prostitute. But this isn't the usual trip to the seedy low-life: these are well-off people who seem balanced and intelligent. And it's tricky for us to admit that this is just as realistic as the grimier depictions we see in preachier films... FULL REVIEW >

The Congress
dir Ari Folman; with Robin Wright, Harvey Keitel 13/Isr ***.
A film of two halves, this brain-bending drama/thriller is either a provocative exploration of identity in an increasingly digital age or an indulgent visual kaleidoscope that only the filmmaker can understand. Either way, it's bracingly original and often thrilling to watch... FULL REVIEW >