What is Picnic at Hanging Rock about?
Picnic at Hanging Rock is a 1975 Australian mystery film directed by Peter Weir. It tells the story of schoolgirls who disappear during a Valentine's Day picnic at Hanging Rock in Victoria in 1900.
The film is based on the 1967 novel by Joan Lindsay. Many viewers believed the story was true, partly because of its realistic style, but it is fiction. Lindsay deliberately left the mystery unsolved.
Set at Appleyard College, a girls' boarding school, the film follows a group of students and a teacher who climb the rock. Some never return, and the search unsettles the community and the school.
Style and impact
The film is known for its dreamy, eerie atmosphere, soft-focus cinematography by Russell Boyd and haunting pan flute music by Gheorghe Zamfir. It helped launch the Australian New Wave of the 1970s.
It was one of the first Australian films to win international acclaim and made Peter Weir a major director. Anne-Louise Lambert played Miranda, the most famous of the missing girls.
Hanging Rock, a volcanic formation near Mount Macedon, became a tourist attraction because of the film. A television series based on the novel was released in 2018.
Did You Know?
Joan Lindsay's final chapter, explaining the mystery, was removed before publication and released after her death.