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First screening: 6pm Second screening: 8.30pm
Both screenings in the Grand Theatre of the Embassy and open to all Wellington Film Society members - join today to come along: https://wellingtonfilms.nz/join/
On a hot, languid day in February 1900, in the bush near Mt Macedon, Victoria, a group of schoolgirls idle drowsily on a picnic to celebrate St Valentine’s Day. They lie in the shadow of the looming, prehistoric monolith Hanging Rock. Venturing into the bush and ascending the Rock, three schoolgirls and their governess vanish without a trace.
Peter Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock is an evocative, haunting meditation on desire, longing, and the anxiety of settlement. The pull of the unknown, uncontain-able “something” of Hanging Rock resists the class, gender and rigid Victorian structures imposed on the Australian landscape. Throughout the film it almost appears to bristle or pulsate as the ripples of the disappearances begin to take effect.
These incongruous elements contrast to create a slippage and dislocation that eventually dissolves into horror as the narrative progresses. From the first eerie peals of the pan-pipes that mark the film’s musical theme, Picnic at Hanging Rock leaves audiences destabilised, but drawn – as Miranda, Irma Marion and Miss McCraw were – to the mystery at the heart of Hanging Rock.
We have an incredible year of cinema ahead - join up now to see it all! https://wellingtonfilms.nz/programme/
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Embassy Theatre, 10 Kent Terrace, Wellington, New Zealand 6011, New Zealand
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.
