Director – Peter Weir – 1975 – Australia – Cert. 12a – 107m
*****
A group of teenage schoolgirls supervised by two teachers go on a picnic beside an isolated volcanic outcrop: three of them never return – Valentine’s Day previews on Friday & Saturday, February 14th & 15th, then is out in UK cinemas from Friday, February 21st
Two locations sear themselves into your brain when watching Picnic at Hanging Rock, whether for the first time or the umpteenth. One is the obvious one – the eponymous, towering rock formation in Victoria, Australia, at once an inescapable presence in a landscape and an invitation to come into its labyrinth and explore. The other is Appleyard College, a turn of the (nineteenth into twentieth) century boarding school for young ladies, shot in the real life 1870s-built, Georgian mansion Martindale Hall. They are two very different worlds, one natural, wild, and inexplicable, the other buttoned down and socially stratified.
The picnic, which takes place on St. Valentine’s Day, 1900, only seems to take the first third of the film’s running length. Two teachers, Miss Greta McCraw (Vivean Gray from The Last Wave, Peter Weir, 1977) and the French mistress Mlle de Poitiers (Helen Morse) are in charge of around a dozen teenage girls, all dressed very prim and properly. They travel there in a horse and cab. The weather is hot, and it seems the perfect day to eat and lounge around at the base of the rock.
However, four of the girls, Miranda (Anne Lambert from The Draughtsman’s Contract, Peter Greenaway, 1982), Marion (Jane Vallis), Irma (Karen Robson, who later made the unusual transition from actress to providing legal services for movies), and Edith (Christine Schuler), secure the permission of one of the teachers to go exploring, first going through the trees and crossing a little brook, observed by well off young English lad Michael (Dominic Guard from An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, Chris Petit, 1981; The Lord of the Rings, Ralph Bakshi, 1978; The Go-Between, Joseph Losey, 1971), who is particularly taken by the sight of Miranda, and his down to earth, working class Australian companion Albert (John Jarrett from Wolf Creek, 2005, and Wolf Creek 2, 2013, both Greg McLean; Australia, Baz Lurhmann, 2008; The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Fred Schepisi, 1978).
The four girls take themselves up the rock and doze in the sun. The dumpy Edith finds the exertion all a bit too much. The other three leave her to explore the rock further. They remove shoes and stockings. Edith later returns to the main school party without them. Miss McCraw also disappears. Mlle de Poitiers must return to the school with the remaining girls and break the bad news to the Principal, Miss Appleyard (Rachel Roberts from This Sporting Life, Lindsay Anderson, 1963; Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, Karel Reisz, 1960; The Weak and the Wicked, J. Lee Thompson, 1954).
The problem is that being out in the heat for too long is dangerous to health. As fears for the disappeared four grow, Michael takes it upon himself to go and look for them. The heat very nearly does for him, but he at least manages to find Irma, even if he in turn needs to be rescued by Albert. The local police also conduct a search. Irma’s subsequent relationship with the school is unsettled by this, as both her fellow students and the school authorities are unable to find out from her exactly what happened to the other disappeared girls.
Set against the vanishings at the rock is the very different, rigorous world of the fee-paying girls school run by the dour Miss Appleyard who refuses to let one of the girls, an orphan named Sara (Margaret Nelson) who unbeknown to the Head has a crush on Miranda, go on the trip. The girl is subsequently distraught, while the scandal threatens to damage student attendance and therefore the school’s finances. Miss Appleyard sets a deadline by which she is to receive Sara’s unpaid fees, which her guardian has so far failed to send.
Various characters advance their own theories as to what might have happened to the girls at the rock. Perhaps some sort of foul play? The enigma remains strangely believable, even though no decisive explanation is ever offered. Equally compelling, though, is the controlled and repressed world of the girls’ school, counterpointed by the fact of Tom the gardener (Tony Llewellyn-Jones from Where the Green Ants Dream, Werner Herzog, 1984; Man of Flowers, Paul Cox, 1983; The Last Wave) and Minnie the maid (Jacki Weaver from Memoir of a Snail, Adam Elliot, 2024; Silver Linings Playbook, David O. Russell, 2012; Animal Kingdom, David Michod, 2010) secretly sleeping with one another. However, if Appleyard College reveals some of its secrets in the course of the elliptical narrative, the more mysterious and primal Hanging Rock never does.
It’s a mystery film in which the mystery is never solved, even though clues may be dotted around to help you guess. The sense of the piece is heightened by cinematographer Russell Boyd (Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, 2003; The Year of Living Dangerously, 1982; Gallipolli, 1981; The Last Wave, 1977, all Peter Weir) placing bridal veil over the lens to diffuse the image somewhat, not to mention Gheorghe Zamfir’s traditional Romanian panpipe pieces on the soundtrack. Some fifty years after its original release, this unique piece of cinema remains as remarkable, enigmatic and powerful as ever.
Peter Weir’s later career in Hollywood would include films as diverse as The Truman Show (1998) and Witness (1985).
The new 4K Restoration of Picnic at Hanging Rock (Director’s Cut) has Valentine’s Day previews on Friday & Saturday, February 14th & 15th, and is then out in cinemas in the UK from Friday, February 21st.
Trailer: