Birthday's to share this week : 16th - 22nd April 2017.

Do you celebrate your Birthday this week?

Claire Foy does on 16th April - check out my tribute to this Birthday Girl turning 33, at the end of this feature.

Do you also share your birthday with a well known, highly regarded & famous Actor or Actress; share your special day with a Director, Producer, Writer, Cinematographer, Singer/Songwriter or Composer of repute; or share an interest in whoever might notch up another year in the coming seven days? Then, look no further! Whilst there will be too many to mention in this small but not insignificant and beautifully written and presented Blog, here are the more notable and noteworthy icons of the big screen, and the small screen, that you will recognise, and that you might just share your birthday with in the week ahead. If so, Happy Birthday to you from Odeon Online!

Sunday 16th April

• Ellen Barkin - Born 1954, turns 63 - Actress | Producer
• Claire Foy - Born 1984, turns 33 - Actress
• Anya Taylor-Joy - Born 1996, turns 21 - Actress
• Martin Lawrence - Born 1965, turns 52 - Actor | Producer | Writer | Director
• Lukas Haas - Born 1976, turns 41 - Actor | Singer | Songwriter  

Monday 17th April

• Nick Hornby - Born 1957, turns 60 - Writer | Producer
• Sean Bean - Born 1959, turns 58 - Actor | Producer
• Jennifer Garner - Born 1972, turns 45 - Actress | Producer
• Rooney Mara - Born 1985, turns 32 - Actress | Producer  

Tuesday 18th April

• Hayley Mills - Born 1946, turns 71 - Actress
• Maria Bello - Born 1967, turns 50 - Actress | Producer
• America Ferrera - Born 1984, turns 33 - Actress | Producer
• Britt Robertson - Born 1990, turns 27 - Actress
• James Woods - Born 1947, turns 70 - Actor | Producer
• Rick Moranis - Born 1953, turns 64 - Actor | Writer | Producer
• Eric Roberts - Born 1956, turns 61 - Actor 
• David Tennant - Born 1971, turns 46 - Actor
• Eli Roth - Born 1972, turns 45 - Actor | Producer | Writer | Director  
• Edgar Wright - Born 1974, turns 43 - Director | Writer | Producer | Actor  

Wednesday 19th April

• Tim Curry - Born 1946, turns 71 - Actor | Singer
• James Franco - Born 1978, turns 39 - Actor | Producer | Director | Writer | Singer
• Hayden Christensen - Born 1981, turns 36 - Actor | Producer
• Ashley Judd - Born 1968, turns 49 - Actress | Producer
• Kate Hudson - Born 1979, turns 38 - Actress | Producer | Director | Writer | Singer  

Thursday 20th April

• Jessica Lange - Born 1949, turns 68 - Actress | Producer | Singer
• Leslie Phillips - Born 1924, turns 93 - Actor | Producer
• Ryan O'Neal - Born 1941, turns 76 - Actor 
• Andy Serkis - Born 1964, turns 53 - Actor | Producer | Director | Singer 
• Nicholas Lyndhurst - Born 1961, turns 56 - Actor

Friday 21st April

• Charles Grodin - Born 1935, turns 82 - Actor | Writer | 
• Toby Stephens - Born 1969, turns 48 - Actor | Writer | Director 
• James McAvoy - Born 1979, turns 38 - Actor | Producer
• Andie MacDowell - Born 1958, turns 59 - Actress | Producer | 
• Gugu Mbatha-Raw - Born 1983, turns 34 - Actress | Singer

Saturday 22nd April

• Amber Heard - Born 1986, turns 31 - Actress | Producer | Singer
• Jack Nicholson - Born 1937, turns 80 - Actor | Producer | Writer | Director | Singer
• John Waters - Born 1946, turns 71 - Actor | Writer | Director | Producer 
• Lee Tamahori - Born 1950, turns 67 - Director | 
• Jeffrey Dean Morgan - Born 1966, turns 51 - Actor 

Claire Foy was born in Stockport, Manchester, England to mother Caroline - a pharmaceutical company employee and father David Foy - a sales consultant. She is the youngest of three children, and with sister Gemma and brother Robert grew up in Manchester and Leeds. The family moved to Buckinghamshire because of her fathers job relocation, and at age eight her parents divorced. At twelve years of age Claire attended Aylesbury High School for Girls, before going on to Liverpool John Moore's University where she studied drama. She also trained for a year at the Oxford School of Drama, graduating from her studies in 2007, after which she moved to a shared house in Peckham in south-east London.

While studying at Oxford, Foy took roles in several stage plays. In 2008 she scored her small screen debut in a pilot episode of supernatural horror series 'Being Human' which continued its run over five series. That same year she also took a single episode on the BBC's long running medical soap opera 'Doctors'. Later that year she gained the lead role in the fourteen episode mini-series of Charles Dickens 'Little Dorrit' as Amy Dorrit alongside Matthew Macfadyen, Tom Courtenay, Andy Serkis and Eddie Marsan. This led to a role in the two part mini-series 'Terry Prachett's Going Postal' with Charles Dance, David Suchet, Andrew Sachs and Timothy West. This was followed up with made for television film 'Pulse'.

In 2011 Foy secured her big screen debut in the fantasy action adventure film 'Season of the Witch' with Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman and Christopher Lee. That same year came drama film 'Wreckers' with Benedict Cumberbatch, and four episode mini-series 'The Promise' in which Foy took a leading role. Made for television film 'The Night Watch' was released too in 2011, and then 'Hacks' seeing out the year. In between time there was nine episodes over two series of the updated to 1936 London era 'Upstairs Downstairs' as Lady Persephone Towyne which ran from 2010 through to 2012. This led to another television mini-series running across six episodes in 2012 'White Heat' with Sam Claiflin, Jeremy Northam and Juliet Stevenson.

'Vampire Academy' followed in 2014 with Zoey Deutch, Gabriel Byrne, Olga Kurylenko and Joely Richardson, and that same year 'Crossbones' - a nine part mini-series set during the 1700's pirate years with John Malkovich as legendary pirate Edward 'Blackbeard' Teach. Later that year was biographical drama film 'Rosewater' with Gael Garcia Bernal as Iranian/Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari. Two episodes on the four-part mini-series 'The Great War : The People's Story' followed, and then Foy lent her voice work talents as the Narrator on drama documentary 'Frankenstein and the Vampyre : A Dark and Stormy Night' recounting the story of the evening in 1816 which led to the creation of Frankenstein and the first modern vampire story.

Highly acclaimed historical drama 'Wolf Hall' aired over six episodes in 2015 with Damien Lewis as King Henry VIII, Mark Rylance as his trusted advisor Thomas Cromwell and Foy as Anne Boleyn - the second wife of the King. The series also starred Bernard Hill, Tom Holland and Jonathan Pryce and picked up eleven award wins and 42 nominations including the Golden Globe and BAFTA for best limited television series.

This was followed up by a role in 'The Lady in the Van' with Maggie Smith, Jim Braodbent and Alex Jennings, and then her Golden Globe and SAG Award wins for her on the first season of the critically acclaimed Netflix production 'The Queen'. Here she plays the young Princess Elizabeth who ascends to the throne as HRH Queen Elizabeth II and charts her early years up to the mid/late 1960's. Her run however, will come to an end after Season Two concludes as Foy hands over to an older actress to portray the maturing Queen. Season Two is currently in production and goes to air later this year.

This brings us up to date, with love story feature film 'Breathe' due for release in October this year. Starring Andrew Garfield and Foy in the lead roles as husband and wife, this true story of Robin Cavendish is Directed by Andy Serkis and tells the story of how Cavendish became an advocate for the disabled after being diagnosed with Polio at age 28 and given three months to live. He was 64 when he died, confined to a wheelchair and could only breathe by artificial means having been paralysed from the neck down, but this didn't stop him! In between time there have been several stage play appearances over the years including most recently as Lady Macbeth opposite James McAvoy in 2013's 'Macbeth' production at London's West End Trafalgar Studios.

In 2014 Foy married British Actor Stephen Campbell Moore whom she starred alongside in 'Season of the Witch', 'Pulse' and 'Lady in the Van', and with whom she has a daughter, Amalia, born in early 2015. All up Foy has 22 acting credits to her name, she has two award wins for her performance on 'The Crown' and eight other nominations mostly for 'Wolf Hall' including a BAFTA nod.

Claire Foy - a star on the rise and increasingly in demand; has already achieved much in just the nine years since her breakout role but was never sure of her acting abilities when she worked in supermarkets and dead end jobs growing up; is a home girl at heart and is still getting used to being in the spotlight. We'll keep watching Claire as your star shines brighter and in the meantime Happy Birthday to you, from Odeon Online.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

What's new in Odeon's this week - Thursday 19th February 2015.

With all the new release movie hiatus that kick-started 2015, things seem to have dropped a gear now that awards season is almost done and the pressure is off until the Easter Holidays when we can expect new cinema content aimed squarely at that holiday season. Until then, we'll make do with those films Reviewed in previous weeks and still doing the rounds on general release, plus a couple of new releases out in the week ahead that in all probability won't cause a huge stir, but are likely to find an audience nonetheless.

And so we have a Directorial debut from one of America's favourite political satirists, television journalists and two time Oscar Host about an Iranian journalist caught in the proverbial cross-fire while going about his work and paying the price for it; and, Director siblings who brought us one of the most groundbreaking hyped up talked about trilogies in cinema history going back to the world of extravagant Sci-Fi that they know best.

Whatever you choose to watch in the coming week ahead. share your thoughts on Odeon Online in the Comments box immediately below this Post, or any other, and be a movie critic yourself with our ever expanding global readership! Enjoy your film!

JUPITER ASCENDING (Rated M) : Written, Produced and Directed by Andy & Lana Wachowski, who of course brought us 'The Matrix' trilogy in 1999 and then wrapped it up in 2003, have spent US$176M to bring us this foray into fast paced action packed effects laden Sci-Fi with 'Jupiter Ascending'. With a strong cast to help the proceedings this might be the draw card this films needs to give it a boost as Box Office returns have generated a below expectation US$92M faring better outside of the US so far than within it. Anyway, to the story!

Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) cleans upmarket houses for a living with her mother. One day she witnesses a strange phenomenon and takes a photo, but later has no recollection of doing so or what the images in the photo mean. During a minor surgical procedure the medical staff attending to her try to kill here but she is saved by Caine Wise (Channing Tatum) who turns out to be a genetically engineered ex-military fighter and hunter who has been sent from a galaxy far far away to protect and save Jupiter - although she of course has no idea why! When all is revealed it seems that Earth (and many other planets) were seeded long ago by alien royalty who act like a cosmic corporation overseeing numerous interplanetary worlds. It seems that Jupiter by genetic reincarnation is the heir to Planet Earth, but there is an alien family who have other plans for Jupiter Jones and her supposed inheritance - hence the attempt to dispense with her while undergoing surgery! This consists of the Abrasax family (the most powerful of all alien dynasties) - Balem (Eddie Redmayne), Kalique (Tuppence Middleton) and Titus (Douglas Booth) who are at odds with what to do with little old Earth when the family matriarch passes away! The struggles and challenges that ensue could change the course of the cosmos forever, unless Jupiter, with the help of Caine and various others - Stinger Apini (Sean Bean) and Diomika Tsing (Nikki Amuka-Bird) of the inter-galactic Police Force, can overcome those who will stop at nothing to have their way!

ROSEWATER (Rated M) - Jon Stewart is the political satirist, television commentator, media critic, Writer, Producer, Host of The Daily Show, two time Host of the Academy Awards, stand-up comic and now film Director - in this his first outing as such. Here he tells us the story of London based Iranian Canadian BBC journalist Maziar Buhari (Gael Garcia Bernal) who returned to Iran in 2009 to cover the unfolding Presidential elections there, and provides his media footage to foreign publications worldwide. As a result of smuggling election campaign riot footage back to the BBC  he was imprisoned for 118 days in Evin Prison northwest of Tehran where he was mostly blindfolded and harassed, tortured and beaten in isolation for his crime of spying and espionage - the work of a traitor. He was later interviewed by Stewart for the Daily Show which was seen as further evidence that he was indeed a spy and in collaboration with the US Government and the CIA. Buhari's captor and interrogator (Kim Bodnia) for the time spent in Evin Prison was distinguishable only by the smell of rosewater - hence the films title! A poignant, relevant true story deftly handled it seems by first time Director Stewart, that lays a solid foundation for future works.

That's it for this week - two films at complete opposite ends of the spectrum. Whatever you decide to see - either of these, both of these, or any of those still doing the rounds, lets us know your thoughts and share with the cinema going, movie loving film fanatics of the world.

Movies - catch one this week!

-Steve, at Odeon Online-