What's new in Odeon's this week : Thursday 28th November 2019

The 45th People's Choice Awards were held on the evening of Sunday 10th November 2019 at the Barker Hangar at Santa Monica Airport, Santa Monica, California. Honouring the best in film, television, music and popular culture over the last twelve months, this years awards ceremony like the 2019 Academy Awards and 2019 Emmy Awards, the People's Choice Awards had no designated Host. Instead, a good number of celebrities graced the stage to not only present but walk audience members and viewers through highlights of pop culture's biggest moments of the year.

You can get the full low down on all the awards categories, the winners and the also-rans, the photo's and the glamour at the official website, at : https://pca.eonline.com

In terms of the film awards, the winners and grinners on the night were as follows :-
* The Movie of 2019
Awarded to 'AVENGERS : ENDGAME' beating out 'Captain Marvel', 'Fast & Furious Presents : Hobbs & Shaw', 'John Wick : Chapter 3 – Parabellum', 'The Lion King', 'Spider-Man : Far From Home', 'Toy Story 4' and 'Us'.

* The Action Movie of 2019
Awarded to 'AVENGERS : ENDGAME' beating out 'Captain Marvel', 'X-Men : Dark Phoenix', 'Godzilla : King of the Monsters', 'Fast & Furious Presents : Hobbs & Shaw', 'John Wick : Chapter 3 – Parabellum', 'Shazam!' and 'Spider-Man : Far From Home'.

* The Comedy Movie of 2019
Awarded to 'MURDER MYSTERY' beating out 'Good Boys', 'The Hustle', 'Little', 'Long Shot', 'Men in Black : International', 'The Upside' and 'Yesterday'.

* The Drama Movie of 2019
Awarded to 'AFTER' beating out 'Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile', 'Five Feet Apart', 'Glass', 'Once Upon a Time in Hollywood', Rocketman', 'Triple Frontier' and 'Us'.

* The Family Movie of 2019
Awarded to 'ALADDIN' beating out 'The Angry Birds Movie 2', 'How to Train Your Dragon : The Hidden World', 'The Lego Movie 2 : The Second Part', 'The Lion King', 'Pokémon : Detective Pikachu', 'The Secret Life of Pets 2' and 'Toy Story 4'.

* The Male Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Robert Downey Jnr. for 'AVENGERS : ENDGAME'.
* The Female Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Zendaya for 'SPIDER-MAN : FAR FROM HOME'.
* The Male Action Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Tom Holland for 'SPIDER-MAN : FAR FROM HOME'.
* The Comedy Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Noah Centineo for 'THE PERFECT DATE'.
* The Drama Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Cole Sprouse for 'FIVE FEET APART'.
* The Animated Movie Star of 2019
Awarded to Beyonce for 'THE LION KING'.
* The People's Icon Award for 2019
Presented to Jennifer Aniston.

This week we have five latest release new movies coming to your local Odeon in the week ahead. We start off with a murder mystery whodunit from an acclaimed Director, with an all star cast and a premise that is straight out of classic genre playbook from the '70's and '80's and promises to be a whole lotta fun. We then turn to a British biographical drama telling the story of an acclaimed northern English painter of the first half of the last century renowned for his bleak industrial landscapes, and pictures of 'matchstick' men and women. Next up is an animated feature from the House of the Mouse that is a sequel to its most commercially successful animated film ever from 2013 inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale 'The Snow Queen'. We  then have a French foreign language offering recounting the true story of three men who as young boys were physically abused by their local Catholic Priest, and now in their adult years they seek justice to be served for his wrongdoing. And in closing the week we have a much lauded Senegalese supernatural drama rooted in real world social commentary about a rising skyscraper, a discontented workforce, young love and an arranged marriage.

Whatever your taste in big screen film entertainment is this week - be it any of the five latest release new movies as Previewed below, or those doing the rounds currently on general release and as Reviewed and Previewed in previous Blog Posts here at Odeon Online, you are most welcome to share your movie going thoughts, opinions and observations by leaving your relevant, succinct and appropriate views in the Comments section below this or any other Post. We'd love to hear from you, and in the meantime, enjoy your big screen Odeon outing during the week ahead.

'KNIVES OUT' (Rated M) - here with a change of pace and genre compared to his last mega budget space opera epic that was 2017's 'Star Wars : The Last Jedi', Rian Johnson writes, Directs and Co-Produces this throw back to the murder mystery whodunit's of yesteryear. Aside from the aforementioned 'Star Wars' instalment, Johnson has also Directed and Written 'Brick' (his big screen debut in 2005), then 'The Brothers Bloom', 'Looper' and helmed several episodes of 'Breaking Bad' in between. In wanting to craft an Agatha Christie inspired type film, Johnson sought the influences from such classic comedic murder mystery crime stories as 'Murder on the Orient Express', 'Murder by Death', 'Death on the Nile', 'The Mirror Crack'd', 'Evil Under the Sun', 'Deathtrap' and 'Clue'. With a budget of US$40M, the film saw its World Premier at TIFF in early September, goes on general release this week, and has generated widespread Critical acclaim.

And so, here we have renowned and wealthy crime novelist Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) who invites his extended dysfunctional family to his remote mansion on his 85th birthday in hopes of reuniting them all. However, the day after the birthday party, Harlan is found dead by members of the family. The Police, along with experienced Detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), are called in to investigate. Pretty soon, it becomes clearly evident that everyone in the family is a suspect in his death. With an ensemble cast that also takes in Jamie Lee Curtis, Chris Evans, Michael Shannon, Toni Collette, Don Johnson, Ana de Armas, Katherine Langford, Jaeden Martell, Lakeith Stanfield, Frank Oz, Noah Segan and Riki Lindhome.

'MRS. LOWRY & SON' (Rated PG) - here we have a British biographical drama film Directed by British theatre and film Director Adrian Noble in only his third big screen outing following 1996's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' and 2015's 'The Importance of Being Earnest'. Timothy Spall is renowned English artist L.S. Lowry who lived from 1887 until 1976 and is famous for painting scenes of life in the industrial districts of North West England in the mid-20th century. Many of his drawings and paintings depict Pendlebury in Lancashire, where he lived and worked for more than forty years, and also Salford and its surrounding areas. This film charts the story of how Lowry lived with his overbearing mother, Elizabeth (Vanessa Redgrave), until her death in 1939. Bed-ridden and bitter, Elizabeth actively tries to dissuade her bachelor son from pursuing his artistic ambitions, whilst never failing to voice her opinion at her disappointment in him. Spall previously played J. M. W. Turner, also a famous painter in the 2014 biographical film 'Mr. Turner' which won him the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor. This film costs US$1.5M to make, saw its Premier screening at the Edinburgh Film Festival in late June, went on general release in the UK at the end of August, and now gets its release in Australia having garnered mixed Review along the way.

'FROZEN II' (Rated PG) - with the massive success of Disney's 2013 animated feature film 'Frozen' which cost US$150M to make and raked in US$1.28B at the global Box Office and picked up a whole swathe of award wins, nominations and records along the way, I guess it was inevitable that a sequel would come along eventually. And so, here we have it! Once again Directed by Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee, here three years after the events of the first film, Elsa (voiced by Idina Menzel) starts to hear a strange sound from the north calling her. Together with her sister Anna (Kristen Bell), Kristoff (Jonathan Groff) and his reindeer Sven, and Olaf (Josh Gad), they embark on a new journey beyond their homeland of Arendelle in order to discover the origin of Elsa's magical powers and to save their kingdom. Also staring the voice talents of Santino Fontana, Evan Rachel Wood, Alfred Molina, Sterling K. Brown, Jason Ritter and Martha Plimpton. The film saw its Premier screening in Hollywood earlier this month, before its US release last week, and its Australian release this week, having so far taken US$372M at the Box Office.

'BY THE GRACE OF GOD' (Rated CTC) - this French and Belgian Co-Produced drama film is Directed by the much awarded film Director and Screenwriter Francois Ozon. It premiered at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival in February this year and won the Jury Grand Prix, before going on general release in France and Belgium in the latter half of February. It has received generally favourable Reviews and has so far earned US$8M off the back of a US$6.8M Production Budget. The film tells the story of Alexandre (Melvil Poupaud), François (Denis Menochet) and Emmanuel (Swann Arlaud) who were each victimised as children by the venerable and predatory, yet highly respected Father Bernard Preynat (Bernard Verley). As adults, when they discover that their former tormentor has been reassigned and has apparently been shielded all along by a heavenly institution determined on silence, the men, still emotionally wounded and facing near-insurmountable challenges to their faith, begin a movement to bring the Catholic Church to account. Apparently, the Priest portrayed in the film, Bernard Preynat, attempted without success to block the films release in France. In July this year, an ecclesiastical tribunal of the Archdiocese of Lyon announced it had determined that Preynat was 'guilty of criminal acts of a sexual character on minors younger than sixteen' and applied its maximum penalty by defrocking him.

'ATLANTICS' (Rated CTC) - is a Senegal, French and Belgian Co-Produced supernatural romantic drama film made by French Director and Actor Mati Diop in her feature film debut outing. It was selected to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, where Diop made history at Cannes, becoming the first black woman to Direct a film featured In Competition. At Cannes, the film won the Grand Prix and has been selected as the Senegalese entry for the Best International Feature Film at next years Academy Awards. In a Senegalese suburb of Dakar that lies along the Atlantic coast, a futuristic-looking tower is about to be officially inaugurated. The construction workers have not been paid for months. One night, the workers decide to leave the country by sea, in search of a brighter future. Among them is Souleiman (Ibrahima Traore), the lover of seventeen year old Ada (Mame Bineta Sane). However, Ada is betrothed to another man. Days later, a fire ruins Ada's wedding and a mysterious fever starts to spread. Ada is unaware Souleiman has returned, and of the implications of his return upon the girlfriends those constructions workers left behind. The film was initially released in Senegal in early August, in France in mid-October and airs on Netflix from this week onwards, having gained universal acclaim along the way. The film is spoken in Wolof - the native tongue of Senegal, the Gambia and Mauritania.

With five new release movies this week to tempt you out to your local Odeon, remember to share your movie going thoughts with your other like minded cinephile friends afterwards here at Odeon Online. In the meantime, I'll see you sometime somewhere in the week ahead, at your local Odeon.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-