Cinema in the Playhouse Just announced
7 September Australian Premiere
NT Live: Inter Alia
Bringing the best of British theatre to the cinema screen, our NT Live series continues with the stage adaptation from the team behind Prima Facie, starring Rosamund Pike (Saltburn, Gone Girl).
Pavements
7 Sep 2025
United States | 2024 | English | Music Documentary An examination of the iconic indie band, Pavements is a prismatic, narrative, documentary, musical, metatextual hybrid, showing the band preparing for their reunion tour while simultaneously preparing for a musical based on their songs, a museum of their history and a big-budget Hollywood biopic, starring Joe Keery and Jason Schwartzman.
Heathers: The Musical
6 Sep 2025
United Kingdom | 2022 | English | Musical | MA15+ Based on the hit film that starred Winona Ryder and Christian Slater, Heathers: The Musical has become a modern musical phenomenon, pairing biting comedy with an unforgettable rock score. This special filmed performance of Heathers: The Musical was recorded live at The Other Palace, London during its phenomenally successful West End run.
Africa Film Fest Australia: I Do Not Come To You By Chance
4 Sep 2025
Nigeria | 2023 | English and Igbo | Comedy | PG Kingsley has the smarts but no prospects for a job after university. Burdened with family responsibilities, he turns to his charismatic uncle, an email scammer who lures him into a web of deceit — a decision that will change the course of his life. Winner of the Africa International Film Festival Audience Choice Award, presented in Lagos, Nigeria.
Africa Film Fest Australia: Fanon
5 Sep 2025
France, Luxembourg, Canada | 2024 | French and Arabic with English subtitles | Biopic | M Jean-Claude Barny directs a searing biopic of French psychiatrist and philosopher Frantz Fanon. Spotlighting a series of events in the 1950s when his methods profoundly clashed with those around him, FANON shines a spotlight on the efforts of this renowned and influential thinker, working at the epicentre of colonisation.
Taiwan Film Festival in Australia: Flowers of Shanghai
6 Sep 2025
Tony Leung and Michiko Hada star in the 4K restoration of the Hou Hsiao-hsien’s 1998 Palme d’Or nominated masterpiece, presented as the Closing Night of the 2025 Taiwan Film Festival in Australia.
Saturday Film Club: Children of Men
6 Sep 2025
Join us for the first in our regular Saturday Film Club screenings, pairing a contemporary classic with an in-depth discussion featuring Alexei Toliopoulos and special guests. Ranked by Rolling Stone as the best sci-fi film of the 21st century, Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men explores what it means to carry hope in hopeless times.
Kiki’s Delivery Service
7 Sep 2025
Japanese | 1989 | English (Dubbed) | Family/Fantasy | G Young witch Kiki, with her talking cat Jiji by her side, opens a flying courier service; and is soon confronted by her own doubt and fears on the path to independence and friendship. It is tradition for all young witches to leave their families on the night of a full moon to learn their craft. That night comes for Kiki (Kirsten Dunst), who follows her dream and embarks on the experience of a lifetime.
Fallen Angels
7 Sep 2025
Hong Kong | 1995 | Cantonese language with Chinese and English subtitles | Action/Drama/Romance | M Wong Kar Wai’s fifth feature follows the blueprint of his earlier film Chungking Express, intertwining neo-noir comedy-drama narratives of urban loners as they crash headlong across the streets of Hong Kong.
10 Things I Hate About You
5 Sep 2025
United States | 1999 | English | Romantic Comedy | PG A love letter to Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, this late 90s classic comedy pitches the bad-boy swagger of Heath Ledger against the smart-ass glare of Julia Stiles in a twisted rom-com for any generation. “I hate the way I don’t hate you… not even close, not even a little bit…”
Queer Screen Film Fest & ACON: Holding the Man (10th Anniversary Screening)
6 Sep 2025
Australia | 2015 | English | Romance, Drama | MA15+ Based on the much-loved Australian queer memoir, Holding the Man is the story of a fifteen year love affair starring Ryan Corr and Craig Stott, alongside Guy Pearce, Anthony LaPaglia, Sarah Snook and Kerry Fox. The course of teenage love rarely runs smooth, but this is especially true when you’re secretly gay in an Aussie all-male school in the 1970s and entranced by the captain of the football team.
Wrong Side of the Road
4 Sep 2025
This documentary-style classic 80s drama follows the Indigenous bands Us Mob and No Fixed Address as they move from gig to gig. Blending dramatisation with real events, it captures the energy of life on tour while exposing the racism, hostility and harassment the musicians faced.
SongRites Short Films
3 Sep 2025
Experience four powerful First Nations short films by First Nations storytellers from regional communities, underpinned by their connection to Country and culture – Katele (Mudskipper), The Djarn Djarns, Bala and Jarda Bura, Gurri Bura, Jarda Ngarli, Gurri Ngarli. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are warned that content from this event may contain images and voices of deceased persons. Katele (Mudskipper)Australia | 2022 | English | Drama | M
Shortwave x Red Room Poetry: Short Films
3 Sep 2025
Australia | 2025 | Short Films | Unclassifed 15+ Celebrating National Poetry Month, Shortwave x Red Room Poetry is an evening of new and recent short films, curated in collaboration to celebrate the diversity, breadth, and breath of contemporary poetry beyond the page in search of the ambient light.
As Tears Go By
31 Oct 2025
Hong Kong | 1995 | Cantonese language with Chinese and English subtitles | Action/Drama/Romance | R18+ Wong Kar Wai’s scintillating debut feature is a kinetic, hyper-cool crime thriller graced with flashes of the impressionistic, daydream visual style for which he would become renowned.
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
2 Nov 2025
Japan | 1984 | English (Dubbed) | Family/Fantasy | PG Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind is Hayao Miyazaki’s visionary tale of hope and heroism in a world on the brink. A soaring fusion of science fiction and ecological myth, this hand-drawn masterpiece is as breathtaking today as when it first took flight.
Happy Together
23 Jan 2026
Hong Kong | 1997 | Cantonese language with Chinese and English subtitles | Romance/Drama | M One of the most searing romances of the 1990s, Wong Kar Wai’s emotionally raw, lushly stylized portrait of a relationship in breakdown casts Hong Kong superstars Tony Leung and Leslie Cheung as a couple locked in a turbulent cycle of infatuation and destructive jealousy.
Laputa: Castle in the Sky
24 Jan 2026
Japan | 1986 | English (Dubbed) | Adventure/Fantasy | G Studio Ghibli’s first feature, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, is a soaring adventure that blends fantasy, science fiction, and heartfelt coming-of-age. Join Sheeta and Pazu as they race sky pirates and military forces to uncover the secrets of a lost floating city.
Days of Being Wild
1 May 2026
Hong Kong | 1990 | Cantonese language with Chinese and English subtitles | Romance/Crime | M Wong Kar Wai’s breakthrough second feature represents the first full flowering of his swooning signature style. The first film in a loosely connected, ongoing cycle that includes In the Mood for Love and 2046.
Porco Rosso
3 May 2026
Japan | 1992 | English (Dubbed) | Fantasy/Adventure | PG Above the golden waters of the Adriatic, a world-weary pilot cursed with the face of a pig roams the skies in search of lost honour and forgotten dreams. Porco Rosso is Hayao Miyazaki’s wry and wistful tale of love, flight, and the price of staying true to yourself.
