THE GOOD BOY : Tuesday 9th June 2026.

As part of this years Sydney Film Festival I saw 'THE GOOD BOY', aka 'HEEL' at my local independent movie theatre earlier this week. This Polish and UK Co-Produced black comedy thriller film is Directed by Jan Komasa, whose previous feature film output include 'Suicide Room' in 2011, 'Warsaw 44' in 2014, 'Corpus Christi' in 2019, 'The Hater' in 2022 and 'Anniversary' in 2025. This film is Komasa's first English language feature. It had its World Premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in early September last year, was released in the USA in late March, has received generally positive critical reviews, and has so far grossed US$1.2M at the Box Office. The film goes on general release here in Australia on 2nd July. 

The film opens following the extremely anti-social behaviour of 19-year-old Tommy (Anson Boon). He is a foul-mouthed, drug-abusing, beer swilling delinquent hooligan with a penchant for random acts of extreme violence - all of which he records and uploads to his social media pages for all the world to see. During a night out with his girlfriend Gabby (Savannah Steyn), Tommy becomes heavily drunk and stoned, can barely walk and later becomes separated from his friends, after his bender late at night. He is then abducted on the street by an unknown figure.

Macedonian national Rina (Monika Frajczyk) meets with a man named Chris (Stephen Graham) in a cafe to interview for a housekeeping job. After a series of fairly simple questions Chris invites her to his large isolated countryside home where she signs a non-disclosure agreement and is taken for a tour of the house, meeting Chris's reclusive wife Kathryn (Andrea Riseborough) and their ten-year-old son Jonathan (Kit Rakusen). While viewing the cellar downstairs, Rina observes an unconscious Tommy chained to the ceiling. She attempts to leave, but Chris stops her and says he is aware of her past and uncertain visa situation. Following a threat to call his contact in the Home Office, Rina agrees to take the job - working two days a week on a Monday and Thursday.

Tommy is revealed to have been in the house for some time. He regularly antagonises and threatens Chris, and attempts to reason with Rina for help when she works in the cellar either loading up the washing machine or mopping the stone floor. Chris forces Tommy to watch educational films starring Chris and his family, as well as clips of Tommy's anti-social capers or violent attacks uploaded online. Tommy maintains his abusive attitude to which Chris responds with kindness and lectures, claiming that he is trying to help Tommy become a better person, though he shows no reluctance in beating or tasering Tommy whenever he resists his captivity, such as when he throws his urine-soaked clothes at Kathryn's face. Following this latter episode Chris severely beats Tommy with a Police extendable baton multiple times shouting out 'bad boy' with every blow. 

As time progresses and Tommy's manner starts to become more passive, Kathryn begins giving him books to read and the family allows him to watch movies with them. His temperament calms and he slowly builds a civil rapport with everyone in the household, especially Jonathan. After celebrating Tommy's birthday with a picnic out on the Yorkshire moors, Chris moves him to a room upstairs, having constructed a ceiling-mounted track system to which Tommy's chain is attached, allowing him to move throughout the house. However, Chris has also inserted combination locks throughout the track to control Tommy's movement and prevent him from venturing downstairs unsupervised. 

Later Rina advises the family that she thinks she is being followed, and fears for her safety. They invite her to move into the house, which she does. At Tommy's urging, Chris employs his and Rina's assistance in arranging a romantic dinner for Kathryn in the back garden. Though this is a success, Tommy is able to steal a knife from the kitchen drawer as the family is distracted in the garden, and hides it in a pot plant. Upstairs, while Chris thanks him for his help, Tommy asks why he in particular was abducted. Chris does not give a straight answer. Tommy states he is aware that his room once belonged to someone else, and asks who. 

One day, when Chris is out for a drive, a gang of three men break into the house seeking Rina. She agrees to leave with them, though before doing so she whispers the four digit combination code to the locks in Tommy's ear. Tommy then attacks the men but they overpower him, and beat him up. When Chris returns, he thanks Tommy for protecting 'their' family, and reveals his plan to install a security system and motion detectors on the property, which he says that Tommy can help him with the installation. That night, Tommy gingerly opens the combination locks and sneaks downstairs, taking the hidden knife and using it to pry his chain from the track. Chris, awakened, comes down with a handgun, but Tommy attacks from behind and disarms him, after which Kathryn arrives. Tommy says that he will never be the person who used to live in his room and demands to go free. Heartbroken in her husband's arms, Kathryn agrees to let Tommy leave. He does so walking out into the night, later collapsing in the middle of a deserted stretch of road. 

Having returned home, after two months away, Tommy does not admit to the interviewing Police Officer (Jessica Johnson) that he was abducted and claims he went away with his friend 'Jonathan'. The Police Officer says that a friend, Gabby, reported him as a missing person, while his mother admitted texting him twice, but as he never responded she gave up. Later he encounters Gabby in a nightclub, heavily wasted from drugs and alcohol. The next day Gabby pulls up at Tommy's house and they drive off with Tommy driving. They park up in a remote area and she says that she wishes she could 'disappear'. Tommy asks if she trusts him. When she says yes, he incapacitates her with chloroform, torches the car and carries her to the gate of Chris's home. After Tommy rings the buzzer and waits anxiously, the gate opens and he walks towards the house down the long driveway carrying Gabby in his arms, with Chris, Kathryn and Jonathan standing at the door to welcome him back. 

'The Good Boy' is a blacker than black dark comedy psychological thriller that is teetering on the brink of horror, given the opening scenes of Tommy running amok snorting, drinking, punching, kicking, fucking, pissing, arguing and yelling his way through a single night of obnoxious excess, to Chris who keeps his quarry chained to the ceiling for weeks and who is not afraid to wield his own form of justice with a baton, a taser, or a discovered packet of cigarettes belonging to his ten year old son. The performances of Boon, Graham and Riseborough are all top notch and they inhabit their roles with a real sense of believability and realism. Whilst there are certain similarities here with Stanley Kubrick's seminal 1971 film 'A Clockwork Orange', here Director Jan Komasa has substituted the institutionalised rehabilitation for the individuals rehab, and in doing so has delivered us a film that poses the question of 'nature over nurture', the power of social media and the hold it has over young teenagers and young adults that you'll be debating long after the end credits have rolled. 

'The Good Boy' or 'Heel' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a potential five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

What's new at Odeon's this week : Thursday 11th June 2026

The 25th Transylvania International Film Festival (TIFF) takes place this year from Friday 12th June through until Sunday 21st June, in the capital of Romania - Cluj-Napoca, a modern city with a rich history. Founded in 2002, TIFF is the first and largest international film festival in Romania and one of the most important film events in the region, with over 100,000 participants at each edition. Open to the general public as well as industry professionals, the TIFF showcases over 250 films and its programme includes cine-concerts, concerts, as well as art exhibitions and meeting opportunities between filmmakers and the Romanian audiences. The festival has taken on the mission of discovering new voices in cinema and hosts two international competitions - feature fiction and feature documentary - dedicated to first and second-time Directors, as well as an annual showcase of contemporary Romanian cinema . . . . . so reads the official website.

This years Opening Gala film presentation is '3 Days in September' from Romania and Directed by Tudor Giurgiu, and will have its Romanian Premiere after its World Premiere screening at the recent International Film Festival Rotterdam. Built around a single 65-minute long take, this romantic comedy is laced with dark humour. While vacationing on the coast ahead of their wedding, a couple's plans are upended on the eve of the celebration when a mysterious woman appears and delivers a shocking revelation to the bride-to-be about her partner. What follows is an intense night that forces the protagonist to confront her deepest fears and hardest choices. 

First and second-time Directors are yet again set to compete for top honours at this years festival. Twelve films from around the world will vie for the coveted Transylvania Trophy and other accolades in the Official Competition, while ten works will compete for the top prize in the What's Up, Doc? section. Those films in Official Competition are as given, in brief, below :-

* 'Sicko' - from Kazakhstan and Directed by Aitore Zholdaskali. A cynical, hard-boiled debut from the kazakh Director, already a box-office hit in his home country;
* 'Feels Like Home' - from Hungary and Directed by Gabor Holtai. A claustrophobic debut in which family functions as the amniotic fluid required to force a human being into existence.
* 'Le Roi Soleil' ('No One Will Know') - from France and Directed by Vincent Mael Cardona. A slick, high-concept collision of heist movie and slasher, centred on a winning lottery ticket and driven by the kind of greed that can only end badly.

* 'A Useful Ghost' - from France and Directed by Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke. Anarchic and oddly tender, the film uses absurdism to ask serious questions about love and the wrongs we leave unaddressed.

* 'Lionel' - from Spain and Directed by Carlos Saiz. An experiment on both sides of the lens - a road movie built around a script the cast never saw, yet one that arrives at a universal truth about fathers and sons.
* 'The Night is Fading Away' - from Argentina and Directed by Ezequiel Salinas and Ramiro Sonzini. A bittersweet love letter to cinema, in which a displaced projectionist takes a job as a night watchman at a cinema and gradually builds an unlikely community around old films;

* 'Truly Naked' - from the Netherlands and Directed by Muriel d’Ansembourg. The film makes nudity and sex matter-of-fact, then pivots to the harder question - whether shedding your clothes is the same as opening yourself up.
* 'Titanic Ocean' - from Greece and Directed by Konstantina Kotzamani. The film follows young women training to become professional mermaids in a world that never stops demanding reinvention.

* 'Butterfly' - from Norway and Directed by Itonje Soimer Guttormsen. The story tracks two sisters working through the long shadow of a guru mother, with self-knowledge serving as the film’s uneasy currency.

* 'My Father's Shadow' - from the UK and Directed by Akinola Davies Jnr. The film operates as a dream-memory of a political turning point and how it echoes through one family across generations.
* 'Our Father' - from Serbia and Directed by Goran Stankovic. The film examines the cult of a surrogate patriarch at a Serbian monastery for recovering addicts, and the difficulty of dismantling something that can’t be entirely condemned.
* 'The Red Hangar' - from Chile and Directed by Juan Pablo Sallato. A lean, pressure-cooker thriller about honour and duty during the Pinochet coup, remarkable for how much it achieves with limited means.

For a summary of the ten films in the Documentary Official Competition, plus the details of all the other films being showcased, and a whole lot of other good stuff, you can go to the official website at : http://www.tiff.ro/en

Drawing the attention then back to this weeks seven hot new release movies coming to your local big screen Odeon, we kick off with a Sci-Fi offering from a Director who is a master of his craft, and that films tag line is 'If you found out we weren't alone, if someone showed you, proved it to you, would that frighten you?' - enough said! Then we have a crime thriller in which a talented piano tuner's meticulous skills for tuning pianos lead him to discover an unexpected aptitude for cracking safes, turning his life upside down. Next up is an Italian adventure drama film in which a young woman travels to Piedmont to care for her ageing grandfather, an expert truffle forager. This is followed by another Italian drama film set in early 18th century Venice, Italy, where the fate of a virtuoso violinist is transferred when her orphanage hires an ambitious composer as the new musical instructor, one Antonio Vivaldi. In a completely different vein, we have next an Aussie comedy in which a group of students and teachers from a Language school in Delhi hit the road to discover Australia and gain first-hand experience of its authentic culture and language. Then we turn to a South Korean action horror film which follows a deadly, rapidly mutating viral outbreak inside a quarantined biotech facility; before closing out the week with an American biographical musical film charting the life and times of this man from surfer to filmmaker to world-renowned musician.

Whatever your taste in big screen film entertainment is this week - be it any of the seven latest release new films as Previewed below, or those doing the rounds currently on general release or 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.

'DISCLOSURE DAY' (Rated M) - is an American Science Fiction film that is based on an original story, Co-Produced and Directed by Steven Spielberg, who I'm sure needs no introduction. Spielberg is no stranger to the world of Sci-Fi having helmed 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' in 1977, then 'E.T.' in 1982, 'A.I. Artificial Intelligence' in 2001, 'Minority Report' in 2002, 'War of the Worlds' in 2005 and 'Ready Player One' in 2018. This film is released in the US this week too. 

If you found out we weren’t alone in the infinite universe, if someone showed you, proved it to you, would that frighten you? When cybersecurity expert Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) and Kansas City meteorologist Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) discover proof of alien life simultaneously, they try to reveal the truth to the world all at once, while facing intense government secrecy. Also starring Colin Firth, Colman Domingo, Eve Hewson and Wyatt Russell.

'TUNER' (Rated MA15+) - this USA and Canadian Co-Produced crime thriller film is Co-Written and Directed by Daniel Roher in his debut narrative fiction film following his documentaries 'Once Were Brothers : Robbie Robertson and the Band' in 2019 and the Academy Award winning 'Navalny' in 2022, and 'The AI Doc : Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist' which Premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January this year and is scheduled for release later on in 2026. Niki White (Leo Woodall) a gifted young piano tuner whose heightened sense of hearing draws the attention of Israeli criminals, who see his talents as useful for opening safes as well as for tuning Steinways. With his once-promising musical career over, he works across New York with his mentor Harry Horowitz (Dustin Hoffman), encountering a range of characters, including composition student Ruthie (Havana Rose Liu), with whom he forges an unexpected connection. Niki's safecracking work threatens his budding romance with Ruthie and pulls him into increasingly dangerous territory. Also starring Jean Reno, Lior Raz and Tovah Feldshuh. The film had its World Premiere at the Telluride Film Festival in late August last year, was released in the US towards the end of May, has garnered generally positive critical acclaim, and has so far recouped US$5M at the Box Office from its US$7M production budget outlay.

'TRIFOLE' (Rated M) - is an Italian adventure drama film Co-Written and Directed by Gabriele Fabbro in his second feature film outing following 2021's 'The Grand Bolero' although he has helmed numerous short films and the occasional documentary. A modern fable about truffles, sustainability and family. Trifole, set in the Alba, Piedmont White Truffle region of Italy, tells the adventure of a young woman, Dalia (Ydalie Turk) who leaves London looking for her own path, and who reconnects with her ailing, truffle-hunting grandfather Igor (Umberto Orsini) and nature. Eventually, she bonds with her grandfather and learns to value tradition, the territory, and a more sustainable way of life. The film was released in its native Italy in mid-October 2024, in the USA in mid-October 2025 and only now does it get a limited release here in Australia, having so far grossed US$77K from a production budget of US$1.6M, and has generated largely favourable reviews. 

'PRIMAVERA' (Rated M) - this Italian and French drama film is Co-Written and Directed by Damiano Michieletto in his feature filmmaking debut, and is based on the 2008 novel 'Stabat Mater' by Tiziano Scarpa. Early in the 18th century, Ospedale della Pieta is the biggest orphanage in Venice, but it is also where the most talented of the orphans who live there are introduced to the study of music. A talented violinist, Cecilia (Tecla Insolia), confined to the orphanage, meets Antonio Vivaldi (Michele Riondino) who becomes her teacher. Under his mentorship and through his music, she gains courage to break free from the life she was destined for and pursue her passion. The film saw its World Premiere screening at the Toronto International Film Festival in early September last year and was released in Italy on Christmas Day last year, and has generated largely positive critical press.

'HOW TO TALK AUSTRALIANS' (Rated M) - is an Australian comedy film Co-Written and Directed by Tony Rogers who made his feature film debut with 'Rats and Cats' in 2007 and has Directed multiple episodes of TV series in the intervening years. This his second feature, tells the story of a group of Indian students and teachers from The Delhi College of Linguistics who leave the classroom and head Down Under to discover Australia and gain first-hand experience of its authentic language and culture. When their plane is diverted to the country town of Dubbo due to storms, and their tour-leader is detained by customs, the hapless bunch unearth the ‘real’ Australia while never making it to Sydney, Melbourne . . . or even Brisbane. Starring Shane Jacobson, Stephen Curry, Esha Banavali, Rohan Ganju and Udara David. The film cost in the region of US$1.5M to produce. 

'COLONY' (Rated MA15+) - this South Korean action horror film is Co-Written and Directed by Yeon Sang-ho who made his feature length debut with the animated 'The King of Pigs' in 2011, and which he would follow up with another animated feature 'The Fake' in 2013. His first live action feature was the acclaimed 'Train to Busan' in 2016, which was followed by the adult animated zombie horror 'Seoul Station' as a prequel that same year. His second live action film was 'Psychokinesis' in 2018, then 'Peninsula' in 2020, 'JUNG_E' in 2023, 'Revelations' in 2025 and 'The Ugly' also in 2025. A biotechnology professor, Kwon Se-jeong (Jun Ji-hyun), is in attendance at a biotech conference that erupts into chaos with the release of a rapidly mutating virus. The outbreak results in the transformation of infected individuals, prompting authorities to seal off the facility and trap survivors inside with an escalating threat. The film Premiered in the Midnight Screenings section of the Cannes Film Festival in mid-May this year, was released in its native South Korea on 21st May, cost in the region of US$12M to produce having so far grossed US$32M, and has received mixed or average reviews.

'JACK JOHNSON : SURFILMUSIC' (Rated PG) - is an American biographical documentary film Directed by Emmett Malloy who has Directed numerous music videos for acclaimed recording artists, including Jack Johnson, and a number of feature length films including 'Out Cold' in 2001, the musical doco 'Big Easy Express' in 2012, 'The Tribes of Palos Verdes' in 2017, and the music doco 'Biggie : I Got a Story to Tell' in 2021. This film chronicles Jack Johnson’s evolution from surfer to filmmaker to world-renowned musician. It traces how Jack’s early years making surf films with close friends became a foundation for a much broader creative life, capturing moments in and out of the water that later surfaced in his songwriting. Blending rare footage from those formative surf films and Jack’s personal and family archives with present-day reflections, the film weaves together how lived experience, friendship, and exploration shaped the sound and stories behind the music. 

With seven new release movie offerings 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 at your local Odeon in the coming week.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

BACKROOMS : Tuesday 2nd June 2026

I saw the M Rated 'BACKROOMS' earlier this week, and this American Sci-Fi psychological horror film is Directed and Co-Scored by Kane Parsons. This is his feature film making debut, and is based on his own web series published in January 2022 as the short film 'The Backrooms (Found Footage)' which he posted to his YouTube channel, and which went viral and expanded into twenty-four more short films culminating in a web series that has had 77 million views as of May 2026. The film Premiered in Los Angeles in early May and was released in the US and here in Australia last week, having received positive critical reviews and grossing so far US$140M at the global Box Office from a production budget of US$10M. It has also made the twenty-year-old Kane Parsons the youngest filmmaker to reach number one at the American Box Office. As recently as last month Kane Parsons confirmed that he was not done with 'Backrooms', and already this month he is actively searching for a screenwriting collaborator to work with on the sequel.

It is 1990, and a group of scientists from the Async Research Institute watch recovered video filmed by researcher Naren Warne (Avan Jogia), who, while on an expedition into a vast apparently never ending extradimensional space was separated from his group and chased, attacked and seemingly killed by an unknown entity. 

Furniture store owner and failed architect Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is struggling to cope with his alcoholism and the recent breakdown of his marriage. He regularly meets with therapist Mary Kline (Renate Reinsve), who is working through her own childhood trauma related to her agoraphobic, paranoid mother following the demolition of the home she grew up in, to make way for a fifty storey high condo tower. Clark is preoccupied with the store's escalating finances, and in particular his electricity bill. He hires an electrician to investigate the cause of this, including regular occurrences of flickering lights. The electrician finds three coloured breaker switches installed at an odd angle at the base of the distribution board that, as far as he can tell do not connect to anything inside the store.

Clark, who bemoans to Mary that his ex-wife kicked him out of the home he paid for, and whose tuition he is paying for in order that she can become a lawyer, takes to living in his store. Clark experiences continued electrical irregularities including flickering lights and his TV cutting out unexpectedly. This leads him down to the basement level, where out of frustration his flicks all the electrical switches on the distribution board to off. Upon turning to leave and go back upstairs, he notices a glowing narrow slit in a wall, that would have been invisible with the lights on. He tentatively touches the wall adjacent to the sighted split and falls through the wall into the Backrooms - a labrynthine and chaotic expanse of dull yellow rooms, long corridors and misplaced and malformed furniture - some of it standing alone, and some of it stacked high randomly. The rooms are eerily silent apart from the constant low hum of the overhead fluorescent lights. Clark decides to investigate and this leads him to finding Naren's belongings. He narrowly escapes back to the store when an unseen creature chases him. Async scientist Phil (Mark Duplass) watches these events as they occur via a surveillance camera. 

Clark, in his next session with Mary, tells her about the Backrooms but is met with a high degree skepticism, even though he is decidedly nervous to the point of physically shaking. He further says that he has visited them many times since his last meeting with her and has drawn a map of the layout of what he had seen up to that point. 

He recruits his assistant manager, Kat (Lukita Maxwell), and her boyfriend, Bobby (Finn Bennett), to help him film the Backrooms as proof of his claims. The trio enter and record their discoveries, even though Kat is very reluctant while Bobby is gung-ho about the prospect. While exploring a steeply sloped corridor, Bobby is ambushed and apparently killed by an unseen entity, which drags him along with Clark and Kat into an unexplored area where they are separated. Clark runs through various bizarre and disordered spaces, eventually coming across humanoid entities in a red lit room with a glowing Christmas tree in the centre. He is chased to a dead end. He hears Kat call out to him from behind a wall, and places the camera down to look for a concealed door to reach her. Something unknown then picks up the camera, as Kat screams for Clark to look behind him. 

Later, Mary receives a message on her answering machine from Clark, who tells her that he will not be returning for more sessions. Meanwhile, while watching TV with his family, Phil recognises Clark in an ad for his furniture store - where Clark is dressed up as a one legged pirate Cap'n Clark (the mascot of his store). Mary visits the store, finds it deserted but the front door open. She ventures down to the basement level where she notices the outline of the door etched on to the wall previously by Clark, and his map drawn out on a whiteboard. She passes through the doorway into the Backrooms. Fairly soon, she comes across Clark, who chokes her into unconsciousness.

Mary comes round with her arms tied to a chair, with Clark looking on in a space resembling a dining room. They are joined by three monstrous imitations of humans that the Backrooms creates, who look on impassively as he reveals Kat's severed head in a refrigerator. Clark demands that Mary continue their therapy sessions via role-play, but Mary declines, instead revealing that Clark's refusal to take responsibility for his failures was the real reason his wife left him. Clark seems to comes to his senses and releases Mary from her binds, but they are interrupted by the arrival of a towering, distorted replica of Cap'n Clark (Robert Bobroczkyi). Clark is killed while trying to calm the pirate being, which then chases Mary through a seemingly endless maze of chaotic and surreal spaces. 

Cornered by the towering Cap'n Clark in an imperfect copy of the store's showroom, she fights it off using a chunk of concrete with her childhood handprint embedded into it, which she retrieved as a keepsake from the home she was raised in. She uses this to repeatedly bash into Cap'n Clarks face, until it breaks into several pieces. Their struggle triggers an Async gas trap, alerting a group of researchers in hazmat suits, who subdue the entity and take Mary back to their research facility.

Following her recovery, Mary is brought to an interrogation room where she meets Phil. He explains that Async use to manufacture MRI machines until they discovered the Backrooms, which has since become the primary focus of their ongoing research, which is perhaps the most important development in the history of mankind. When asked how she came across the Backrooms and what she found there, she repeats Clark's description of it as a faulty, misremembered copy of reality. Mary asks if Async plans to let her go, but Phil replies evasively. Inside the Backrooms, a series of spaces are depicted by Mary's memories of trauma, ending in a loosely copied interrogation room in which a fractured, deformed Mary sits still, silent and glaring aimlessly into space.

At just twenty-years-of-age, Director Kane Parsons has already stamped his name on the horror genre as a future film maker to be reckoned with. With 'Backrooms' he has here crafted a film induced with fear, dread and anxiety as he ramps up the tension and the atmospheric unease to an unexpected conclusion in which our two protagonists buy the farm. The production values, the score, and the casting are all top notch, and its pleasing to see Ejiofor and Reinsve largely playing against type here and giving it their all in the process. I wouldn't necessarily describe 'Backrooms' as a horror film per se, but more of a dramatic thriller, as it is light on jump scares and blood and gore, but what it does ably deliver is a sense of claustrophobia, disturbing visuals, and unsettling themes that will leave you pondering the film you have just seen long after the end credits have rolled. It is certainly worthy of the price of your cinema ticket, and you should really see it on the big screen to gain an appreciation of the world that Kane Parsons has created for us. 

'Backrooms' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

What's new at Odeon's this week : Thursday 4th June 2026.

The 73rd edition of the Sydney Film Festival this year runs from Wednesday 3rd June through until Sunday 14th June, in the Australian city of Sydney, in New South Wales. This years festival has a line-up of 248 films from 81 countries, with nineteen titles arriving directly from the Cannes Film Festival held at the State Theatre, the Sydney Opera House and cinemas across the city. The competitive film festival, founded in 1954, draws international and local attention, with films including features, documentaries, short films, retrospectives, films for families and animations. Patrons of the festival include Gillian Armstrong, Cate Blanchett, Jane Campion, Nicole Kidman, Baz Luhrmann, George Miller, and Sam Neill. 

This years Opening Night film presentation is 'Silenced', and this biographical documentary is Co-Written and Directed by Selina Miles and based on the book 'How Many More Women?' by Jennifer Robinson and Keio Yoshida. The film tells the story of how after the #MeToo movement broke the cultural silence on gender violence, international human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson fights against the weaponisation of defamation laws to silence survivors and journalists, and tracing the cases of Amber Heard, Brittany Higgins, and Catalina Ruiz-Navarro amongst others. The Closing Night film is 'Paper Tiger' Written and Directed by James Gray. This crime drama film centres around two brothers (Adam Driver and Miles Teller) who pursue the American Dream but get entangled in a dangerous Russian mafia scheme that terrorises their family, testing their bond as betrayal becomes possible. Also starring Scarlett Johansson as the wife of Miles Teller's character.

A small number of prizes existed from the mid-1980's, and prior to 2007, the Sydney Film Festival was classified by the International Federation of Film Producers Associations (FIAPF) as a Non-Competitive Feature Film Festival. In late 2007, the Festival announced it had received funding from the New South Wales Government to host an official international competition, which rewarded 'new directions in film'. The FIAFP has since classified the Sydney Film Festival as a Competitive Specialised Feature Film Festival, with the total prize pool this year worth in the region of AU$200K. 

Sydney Film Prize (awarded to the most 'audacious, cutting-edge, and courageous' film in the Official Competition, endorsed by FIAPF) carries an AU$60K cash prize to the winning filmmaker. Those thirteen titles competing for this years Sydney Film Prize are as given in brief below :-

* Parallel Tales' - from France, USA, Italy and Belgium, this drama film is Co-Written and Directed by Asghar Farhadi. The film follows Sylvie (Isabelle Huppert), a famous author seeking inspiration on the neighbours across the street, who hires the mysterious Adam (Adam Bessa) as assistant, but he quickly turns her life upside down. Also starring Vincent Cassel, Virginie Efira, Pierre Niney and Catherine Deneuve.

* 'Minotaur' - from France, Latvia and Germany and this political thriller drama film is Co-Written and Directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev and is based on the 1969 French film 'The Unfaithful Wife' by Claude Chabrol. Set in 2022 in the backdrop of the Russo-Ukrainian war, broken business executive Gleb (Dmitriy Mazurov) discovers his wife Galina (Iris Lebedeva) has been unfaithful.

* 'Sheep in the Box' - from Japan and Written, Directed and Edited by Hirokazu Kore-eda. It stars Haruka Ayase and Daigo Yamamoto as a couple who welcomes an infant humanoid robot (Kuwaki Rimu), following the passing of their son.

* 'Gentle Monster' - from Austria, Germany and France and Written and Directed by Marie Kreutzer. A renowned pianist relocates with her family from Munich to the countryside, where she uncovers a life-shattering truth that forces her to confront the complexities of love, trust, and deception. Starring Lea Seydoux, Jella Haase, Laurence Rupp, and Catherine Deneuve.

* 'Fatherland' - from Poland, Italy, Germany and France, this biographical film is Co-Written, Directed and Co-Edited by Pawel Pawlikowski. Starring Sandra Huller and Hanns Zischler as Erika Mann and exiled German novelist Thomas Mann, respectively, as they embark on a road trip from Frankfurt, West Germany, to Weimar, East Germany, during the Cold War in 1949. 

* 'The Dreamed Adventure' - from Germany, France, Bulgaria and Austria this drama film is Written and Directed by Valeska Griesbach. On the border between Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey, a woman agrees to help an old acquaintance with an illegal mission.

* 'Ben'Imana' - from Rwanda, Gabon, France, Norway and the Ivory Coast, this drama film is Co-Written and Directed by Marie Clementine Dusabejambo. Set in Rwanda in 2012, the film follows Veneranda, a survivor of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, who is involved in community-led justice and reconciliation. As she faces mounting pressures in her work, a personal crisis within her family forces her to confront the limits of her beliefs.
* 'Fjord' - from Romania, Norway, Denmark, Finland, France and Sweden, this drama film is Written, Co-Produced and Directed by Cristian Mungiu. The film stars Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve as a Romanian-Norwegian couple who face scrutiny after moving to the wife's remote Norwegian hometown.

* 'Shame and Money' - from Germany, Kosovo, Slovenia, Albania, North Macedonia and Belgium and Co-Written and Directed by Visar Morina. A proud family man struggles to provide as financial pressures mount. Though his mother and brother-in-law offer help, accepting support wounds his dignity. As stability slips away, he faces tough choices about pride versus survival.

* 'Dao' - from France, Senegal and Guinea-Bissau, this drama film is Written, Directed and Co-Edited by Alain Gomis. Structured between two ceremonies - a wedding in France and a commemorative ritual in Guinea-Bissau - the film traces a cyclical movement through everyday gestures, encounters, and transitions, blending lived reality with ritual and memory.

* 'No Good Men' - from Germany, France, Norway, Denmark and Afghanistan, this autobiographical drama film is Written, Directed and stars Shahrbanoo Sadat as Naru, the thirty year old and only female camerawoman at a Kabul TV station, who is convinced there are no good men in Afghanistan, until she meets a fifty year old married reporter. 

* 'The Invite' - from the USA and this comedy film is Directed and stars Olivia Wilde, and is an English language remake of the Spanish film 'The People Upstairs' by Cesc Gay. A married couple experiencing a rough patch in their relationship finds themselves invited by their neighbours to engage in their weekly orgies. Also starring Seth Rogen, Penelope Cruz and Edward Norton. 

* 'Leviticus' - from Australia, this romantic supernatural horror film is Written and Directed by Adrian Chiarella. Two teenage boys must escape a violent entity that takes the form of the person they desire most - each other. Starring Joe Bird, Stacy Clausen, Mai Wasikowska, Ewen Leslie and Nicholas Hope. 

For the other competitive sections being showcased - The Documentary Australia Award, the First Nations Award, and the Sustainable Future Award, together with the other sections screened including Special Presentations, International Documentaries, Features, The Tropical Trail and Freak Me Out, plus a whole bunch of other good stuff, you can visit the official website at : http://www.sff.org.au

Turning the attention then back to this weeks five new movies coming to a big screen Odeon near you, we begin with a sword and sorcery offering that is a remake of a dud from 1987, that here sees a young man on Earth who discovers a fabulous secret legacy as the Prince of an alien planet, and must recover a magic sword and return home to protect his kingdom. Then we have a black comedy about a once-celebrated artist's now adult children who enlist a forger to access his unfinished canvases in a deceptive bid to secure an inheritance. This is followed by an adventure drama film centring on two old friends who are walking 600 kilometres through the Scottish highlands, to reconnect with each other, nature and parts of themselves they lost. Next up is a German drama that sees four girls from different time periods who experience their youth on a German farm, as their lives become intertwined until time seems to dissolve. And closing out the week we have an American parody film that is the sixth entry in this franchise in which, some twenty-six years after outrunning a suspiciously familiar masked killer, the Core Four find themselves targeted by another mad slasher.

Whatever your taste in big screen film entertainment is this week - be it any of the five latest release new films as Previewed below, or those doing the rounds currently on general release or 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.

'MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE' (Rated M) - is an American Sci-Fi sword and sorcery film Directed by Travis Knight who made his Directorial debut with the stop-motion animated fantasy film 'Kubo and the Two Strings' in 2016, and he would follow this up with his live action debut with 'Bumblebee' in 2018. After this film he has another stop-motion animated dark fantasy offering in 'Wildwood' due for release later this year. This film is based on the 'Masters of the Universe' media franchise by Mattel, and had its World Premiere screening in Hollywood in mid-May and is released in the USA and here in Australia this week, having cost in the region of US$185M to produce. This is the second live-action film adaptation after the 1987 film which was hailed a critical and commercial failure grossing just US$17M worldwide from a production budget of US$22M, but has since become regarded as a cult film. 

After being separated for fifteen years, the Sword of Power leads Prince Adam Glenn (Nicholas Galitzine) back to Eternia where he discovers his home has been destroyed and is now under the rule of powerful warlord and sorcerer, Skeletor (Jared Leto). In order to reclaim his family legacy and save the world, Adam must join forces with his closest allies, Teela (Camila Mendes) and Man-At-Arms (Idris Elba), and embrace who he is truly meant to be - He-Man, the most powerful man in the universe. Also starring Alison Brie, James Purefoy, Morena Baccarin, Kristen Wiig, Charlotte Riley and Johannes Haukur Johannesson.

'THE CHRISTOPHERS' (Rated MA15+) - this US and UK Co-Produced black comedy film is photographed, Directed and Edited by Steven Soderbergh (with the former under his pseudonym Peter Andrews and the latter under Mary Ann Bernard). Steven Soderbergh's prior feature film credits take in his debut with 'Sex, Lies and Videotape' in 1989 which he would follow up with the likes of 'Out of Sight' in 1998, 'Erin Brockovich' and 'Traffic' both in 2000, 'Ocean's Eleven', 'Ocean's Twelve' and 'Ocean's Thirteen' in 2001, 2004 and 2007 respectively, 'Contagion' in 2011, 'Magic Mike' in 2012, 'Logan Lucky' in 2017, 'Unsane' in 2018, 'No Sudden Move' in 2021, 'Magic Mike's Last Dance' in 2023 and 'Black Bag' in 2025. Here then, Julian Sklar (Ian McKellen) was once a star of London’s 1960’s and 70’s pop art explosion, but he hasn’t painted in decades and has been broke for years. His two estranged children Barnaby Sklar (James Corden) and Sallie Sklar (Jessica Gunning), desperate for an inheritance, hire Lori Butler (Michaela Coel), an art restorer and former forger, to pose as a prospective assistant in order to access eight unfinished canvases Julian has buried deep in storage. Her plan is to complete them, then return them to storage, where they are to be 'discovered' upon Julian’s death, in order for Barnaby and Sallie to claim a small fortune from their sale. The film saw its World Premiere screening at the Toronto International Film Festival in early September last year, was released in the US in mid-April, and the UK in mid-May having generated largely positive critical press, and so far grossing US$2M.

'THE NORTH' (Rated M) - is a Dutch film that is Written, Co-Produced and Directed by Bart Schrijver who made his feature film debut Directing a segment of 'In Cube' in 2015 and would follow this up in his own right in 2022 with 'Human Nature'. Here, some ten years after they were best friends and roommates, Chris (Bart Harder) aged 35 and Lluis (Carles Pulido) aged 34 set out on a 600km hike through the Scottish Highlands. Following the West Highland way and The Cape Wrath Trail, they spend thirty days together in nature - hoping to rekindle their once-powerful friendship. But while Chris remains preoccupied with work and life back at home, Lluis is determined to finish the trail to prove he can do it. The solitude and silence of the highlands forces them to confront harsh truths about themselves, their friendship, and what it truly means to stand still and listen. The film was released in its native Holland at the end of July last year and more recently in the UK and Ireland at the end of April, having generated largely positive critical acclaim.

'SOUND OF FALLING' (Rated MA15+) - is a German drama film Co-Written and Directed by Mascha Schilinski. The film saw its World Premiere in competition at the Cannes Film Festival in mid-May 2025, where it won the Jury Prize. It follows four generations of girls - Alma (Hanna Heckt), Erika (Lea Drinda), Angelika (Lena Urzendowsky) and Lenka (Laeni Geiseler) connected by a remote farm in the Altmark region of Germany. It is structured non-linearly, shifting between the four different time periods - the 1910's, 1940's, 1980's and 2020's where those four women, separated by decades but united by trauma, uncover the truth behinds its weathered walls where gestures, conversations, and situations recur over time. The film was released in Germany in late August last year, has garnered universal critical acclaim and has so far grossed US$5M.

'SCARY MOVIE' (Rated MA15+) - this American parody film is Directed by Michael Tiddes whose previous feature film making credits take in 'A Haunted House' in 2013, 'A Haunted House 2' in 2014, 'Fifty Shades of Black' in 2016, 'Naked' in 2017 and 'Sextuplets' in 2019. This film is Co-Written and Co-Produced by Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, Keenen Ivory Wayans, Craig Wayans, and Rick Alvarez, and is the sixth instalment in the 'Scary Movie' film series, following 2013's 'Scary Movie 5'. The first five films in the series grossed US$897M off the back of combined production budgets of US$172M. Here then, treading on familiar territory, twenty-six years after outrunning a suspiciously familiar masked killer, Shorty Meeks (Marlon Wayans), Ray Wilkins (Shawn Wayans), Cindy Campbell (Anna Faris) and Brenda Meeks (Regina Hall) find themselves targeted by another mad slasher serial killer, monsters and supernatural creatures. Hilarity ensues! The film is released this week too Stateside.

With five new release movie offerings 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 at your local Odeon in the coming week.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-