#OnTheBigScreen: Music, I Am Woman and Cranston Academy: Monster Zone

Songbird previews

There are previews on 13 and 14 February of Songbird. The Covid virus has mutated, and the world is in its fourth year of lockdown. The infected are ripped from their homes and forced into quarantine. Immune to the virus, a courier (KJ Apa) races against time to save the woman he loves (Sofia Carson) from a quarantine camp. Songbird is released on 19 February.

Songbird - A terrifying odyssey into Covid-23, a hypothetical look into our future

Daniel Dercksen  11 Feb 2021

Music

Music is a powerful, original and celebratory artistic statement. In her debut feature as a writer-director, global music legend Sia has created a bold and compelling reinvention of the screen musical that examines how people facing unexpected challenges discover ways to create community and a new sense of family.

The story begins when Zu (Kate Hudson), estranged from her family and a lifelong self-saboteur, finds herself the sole guardian of Music (Maddie Ziegler), her teenage half-sister, after the death of their grandmother. Music is nonverbal and on the autism spectrum, and her grandmother has lovingly created a schedule and daily routine to support her with the help of some neighbourhood friends.

Not having had her grandmother’s experience of loving and caring for Music, Zu instantly struggles with her new responsibility as caretaker. Their less-than-peaceful first breakfast together is overheard by their neighbour Ebo (Leslie Odom), a kind and gentle soul who surprises Zu by demonstrating not only his compassion but his keen understanding of Music. His own slowly revealed life story makes him someone Zu can depend on and learn from as well.

Music combines a heartfelt tale about the power of love with musical sequences that propel and amplify the story, giving the audience a vivid window into the characters’ inner lives.

Music will release as a cinema premiere on DStv Box Office and screened at cinemas on Friday, 12 February 2021.

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I Am Woman

For the first time on screen, I Am Woman tells the inspiring story of singer Helen Reddy, who wrote and sang the song “I Am Woman” that became the anthem for the women’s movement in the 1970s. The film is a story of fearless ambition and passion, of a woman who smashed through the patriarchal norms of her time to become the international singing superstar she always dreamed of being.

This Australian biographical film about singer Helen Reddy is directed and produced by Unjoo Moon, from a screenplay by Emma Jensen. Tilda Cobham-Hervey stars as Reddy alongside Evan Peters, as her manager husband Jeff Wald, and Danielle Macdonald as rock writer Lilian Roxon.

The film releases on 12 February exclusively at the Labia Theatre in Cape Town.

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Cranston Academy: Monster Zone

In the animation film Cranston Academy: Monster Zone, a 15-year-old genius that is always coming up with crazy inventions is bullied for his intelligence and struggling to fit in at school. When he is unexpectedly offered a scholarship to Cranston Academy, a secret, prestigious boarding school for geniuses, Danny views it as a place where his intelligence will be recognised and where he will have a chance to finally fit in. In his quest to prove his intelligence amongst his peers, Danny inadvertently opens a portal to another dimension and unleashes a slew of monsters on the school –giant flying eyeballs, two-headed dogs and a slimy pink tentacle to name a few! Together with his roommate Liz and a half-moth, half-man professor aptly nicknamed Mothman, Danny must overcome the monsters of the fifth dimension and those that lurk inside him to save the school.

It is from Ánima, is a leading animation studio based in Mexico City, Madrid and Canary Islands, directed by Cal Brunker (Escape From Planet Earth), who co-wrote the screenplay with producer Bob Barlen (The Nut Job 2).

Read more about the latest and upcoming films.