An earnest tale of a green-winged wonder

After an exhausting summer buffet of set pieces, superheroes and whatever s-word you might use for Suicide Squad, the gentle Pete's Dragon, to be released on Friday, is a welcome palate cleanser.

Where other summer movies are chest-thumping, it's quiet; where others are brashly cynical, it's sweetly sincere; where others are lacking in giant cuddly dragons, Pete's Dragon has one.

Few may remember the 1977 Disney original, in which a young boy's best friend was a bubbly dragon invisible to others. As part of Disney's continuing effort to remake its animated classics in live-action, Pete's Dragon has been confidently reborn as an earnest tale of a green-winged wonder.