Day three at this year’s London Film Festival, and the pace slows down after the Hollywood one-two of the past two days.

The Sam Rockwell, Hilary Swank double headlined Conviction was the closest the day came to Hollywood glitz, although that’s not a term that I would use to describe Tony Goldwyn’s heavy going emotionally draining, although Goldwyn does coincidentally follow in a line of Hollywood royalty (his Grandfather was Samuel Goldwyn, co-founder of Paramount pictures). The powerful true story of Betty Anne Waters, and the fight to prove her brothers innocence is an interesting, if perhaps a little too familiar feature.

The Arbor, the story of Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar was perhaps the day’s most notable feature, with the combination of factual materials and dramatised footage surprisingly effective. Growing up not a million miles away from the Bradford estate setting of the film struck a nerve, and I have to admit to being far more impressed than I expected to be. The film goes on general release next week., and is well worth catching.

John Sayles is a filmmaker whom I’ve long intended to explore more closely. His latest work Amigo, is an interesting work, with the tale of a US invasion gone awry obviously drawing some contemporary parallels. The invasion at the heart of Amigo is that of the US’s early-twentieth century assault on the Philippines, which is an event which I had very little prior knowledge of before seeing the film. Amigo looks fantastic, but I couldn’t help but find the running time a little much.

The opposite problem could be said about this next film. As a major fan of The Magnetic Fields, I anticipated Strange Powers: Stephin Merritt and the Magnetic Fields heavily. The story at the heart of the film, concerning the elusive front man of the band is one of the most interesting in all of music-dom, and if anything the fleeting running time just wasn’t enough to contain the decade that the filmmakers chronicle.

Derek Cianfrance’s Blue Valentine was the hot ticket for tonight. Ryan Gosling returns to screens alongside Michelle Williams, in a film that set both Sundance and Cannes alive. A beautifully constructed film utilising several different types of film stock to create a bold and inventive visual style, Blue Valentine will be the subject of a fuller review at some point soon.

Check out Hope Lies at 24 Frames Per Second on Sunday for a round-up of the weekends activity.