50 Years of SIFF: Picnic at Hanging Rock
November 27 - December 3, 2023
Voted the best Australian film of all time by members of the Australian Film Institute, Picnic at Hanging Rock from director Peter Weir was a huge favorite when it first screened at SIFF 1979. In the film, a few students and a teacher from an Australian girls' school vanish without a trace during a rural summer picnic.
In the early 1900s, Miranda (Anne Lambert) attends a girls boarding school in Australia. One Valentine's Day, the school's typically strict headmistress (Rachel Roberts) treats the girls to a picnic field trip to an unusual but scenic volcanic formation called Hanging Rock. Despite rules against it, Miranda and several other girls venture off. It's not until the end of the day that the faculty realizes the girls and one of the teachers (Vivean Gray) have disappeared mysteriously.
- Director: Peter Weir
- Principal Cast: Rachel Roberts, Dominic Guard, Helen Morse, Jacki Weaver
- Country: Australia
- Year: 1975
- Running Time: 115 min.
- Producer: Hal McElroy, Jim McElroy
- Screenplay: Cliff Green
- Cinematographers: Russell Boyd
- Editors: Max Lemon
- Filmography: The Way Back (2010), Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003), The Truman Show (1998), Fearless (1993), Green Card (1990), Dead Poets Society (1989), The Mosquito Coast (1986), Witness (1985), The Year of Living Dangerously (1982), Gallipoli (1981), The Last Wave (1977), Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975), The Cars that Ate Paris (1974), Whatever Happened to Green Valley? (1973)