Picnic at Hanging Rock

Peter Weir's undisputed classic of the Australian New Wave screens on Valentine's Day – exactly 126 years since the afternoon the film is set.

St Valentine’s Day, 1900. On a stifling summer’s day, a party of boarders at the exclusive Appleyard College and their chaperones, Mathematics mistress Miss McCraw (Vivean Gray) and the graceful Mademoiselle de Poitiers (Helen Morse), travel to the magnificent ancient rock formation at Mt Macedon. When Miss McCraw and three of the senior girls – Irma, Marion and the ethereal Miranda (Anne-Louise Lambert) – vanish during the course of the afternoon, their disappearance sets off a chain of disquieting and tragic events.

Curator's note

To Saint Valentine!

Described as an horror-romance upon its release by film critic Vincent Canby, Peter Weir's elusive and thoroughly mysterious breakthrough feature is fittingly neither. Celebrated to this day as a beacon of the Australian New Wave, the film is adored by critics and audiences alike.

As potent today as it was when it was released in 1975, Picnic at Hanging Rock remains a film that demands that you take it with you when you leave the cinema and then follows you around like a ghost for years or decades after.

– Reece Goodwin, Senior Programmer (Film & Screen Industry)