What To Watch When Sydney’s Favourite Harbourside OpenAir Cinema Returns This Summer

It’s been 25 years since Cinerent Australia first began screening movies outdoors. Man-aging director Rob Bryant has been there since the beginning, and he’s learned a thing or two about what audiences want. “The criteria I generally look at is whether it’ll look great in this spectacular environment, out in the open on the big screen – and I know it’s not horror,” he says. “There’s a strong female skew to our audience, which I take in-to account.”

This year, Bryant has selected 35 flicks to entertain and educate the thousands of visi-tors who’ll join him at Mrs Macquaries Point, including the premiere of Sofia Coppola’s new movie, Priscilla, Bradley Cooper’s tour de force, Maestro, and the return of the beloved Gosling-McAdams weepy, The Notebook.

The selection has to be pretty solid to compete with the natural scenery of Farm Cove, which overlooks the Royal Botanic Garden, the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. “For a lot of people OpenAir is about summer and escape, so that influences how much of the mix is profound and heavy, and how much is more lighthearted and escapist,” he admits.

And this year, there’s as much of a focus on the culinary offering as the cultural one, with executive chef Mike McEnearney running Summer House Dining, which offers a classic sit-down experience in that exceptional environment, alongside takeaway op-tions from favourites including Bar Copains in Surry Hills, Redfern’s Kepos Street Kitch-en and Chippendale’s LP’s Quality Meats.

To celebrate the return of this Sydney summer tradition, we asked Bryant to select his five favourite movies from this year’s line-up.

The Eight Mountains

Winner of the Jury Prize at Cannes, The Eight Mountains charts the lifelong friendship of Pietro and Bruno, who meet as children in the foothills of the Italian Alps. Beginning in the summer of 1984, the two young men bridge the chasm that inevitably grows between them by building a cabin in the hills. Directed by Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch and based on the novel by Paolo Cognetti, Bryant chose The Eight Mountains for its breathtaking cinematography as much as its depiction of male intimacy. “It’s very beautiful,” says Bryant. “This really is one that looks stunning in the environment, but also has a great narrative. I was absolutely swept away with it.”
Saturday February 17, 2024

Perfect Days

Legendary director (and photographer) Wim Wenders is so damn good he could make a movie about cleaning toilets in Tokyo and it’d be a masterpiece – which is exactly what he does in Perfect Days, a film that explores the rich inner world of Hirayama, whose apparently simple life as a public toilet cleaner reveals hidden depths. “We see this superficial stuff to begin with, but then we learn that there’s so much more to him,” explains Bryant. “It’s a really beautiful, meditative film with a great soundtrack – and Lou Reed plays an integral part. And the lead actor is just to die for.” The judges at Cannes agreed, naming Kōji Ya-kusho Best Actor in 2023.
Sunday February 11, 2024

Dear England

Dear England isn’t strictly cinema: it’s last year’s hottest play filmed live on stage at the National Theatre in London. And, arguably, star Joseph Fiennes will look more impressive sticking out of Sydney Harbour three storeys high for the Australian premiere. In any case, Bryant was impressed when he caught the production last year – he sees it as a meditation on the state of England’s soul. “It’s a bit of a riff on Ted Lasso,” Bryant says. “It’s not really about football – I mean, it is on the surface – but it’s about how you create lasting cul-tural change.”
Wednesday January 24, 2024

Poor Things

Hot tip: Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things is the sleeper hit of the summer. Straight from the director that gave us Dogtooth, The Lobster and The Favourite, Poor Things is a kind of radical feminist take on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Starring Willem Dafoe as the brilliant but unorthodox scientist Godwin Baxter, Mark Ruffalo as the debauched and morally bankrupt lawyer Duncan Wedder-burn and Emma Stone as the reanimated child-woman Bella, there’s a strong Oscar vibe with this “bonkers” film. “It’s a really clever line he walks,” Bryant says. “The ideas in it are really challenging, but it’s a great story at the same time – it’s got some deep thoughts about the female body and the sense of propriety around it.”
Monday February 5, 2024

The Holdovers

The Holdovers sees ac-claimed director Alexander Payne – who was behind the still-so-great Election – reu-nite with Paul Giamatti, who memorably drank a spittoon full of gobby wine in Sideways. This time, Giamatti plays a cranky history teacher at a New England board-ing school, where he’s forced to spend Christmas babysitting trouble-making kids. Com-ic misadventures ensue. “It’s just a really nice story about a bunch of misfits,” says Bry-ant. “There’s a lot of tension, and it’s about the experiences that happen over a week, and obviously what brings them together.”
Wednesday February 7, 2024

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