Cutting Edges - Picnic at Hanging Rock

Figure 1. Pinc at Hanging Rock (1975)

Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock is a Mystery Drama Film and is well known as a movie with no ending which adds to the mystery of it all, it rises more speculation and theories of possible outcomes. A group of young women from Appleyard College arrange a Picnic at Hanging Rock, 4 girls depart from the group to further explore the Rock and only 1 returns to the picnic site causing hysteria as the 3 girls are missing.  From there, a tone of uneasiness is brought to the film as the characters are obsessed with what happened to the girls.

What is really interesting about this movie is the fact that it doesn't have an end and it leaves audiences questioning the same as the characters do, 'what happened to those girls and how?' but sometimes it's best to have a movie with no conclusion, it makes us think more and leave us unsatisfied "Of course the entire point is that there is no explanation. The girls walked into the wilderness, and were seen no more." (Ebert, 1998) If we had an ending it wouldn't feel as special, it would feel like every other movie that has an ending and would lose it's uniqueness.

Figure 2.

The Cinematography (by Russel Boyd) within the movie makes the locations seem real and in the moment but by how it's shot can really make viewers feel unsettled as the rock seems alive and expecting prey "his visionary camerawork keeps resting on plants, animals, hives of restless insects, the screen almost bursting with wildness. Weir’s emphasis is on nature’s alien quality, how these prim girls are set against unknowable forces." (Nathan,2000) Looking at Figure 2. you can see here from how this shot it makes the characters seem claustrophobic and lost in this geological maze, adding to how the rock is watching them and luring them in to take them away.

Figure 3.

The reactions from what the girls did on the rock are surprising as in that period it is seen as quite shameful as a lady to take off you gloves or show your ankles and from that it is expressed that the rock is stripping them from being a girl and turning them into a young woman, a suggestive term of becoming one with nature"The film wants us to sense that the heightened and repressed sexuality of the young students was in some way connected to their disappearance, as if their emotional states interlocked somehow with the living presence of the land." (Ebert,1998) Looking to figure 3. where Irma (one of the 4 missing girls that is found) returns to the School to say her Goodbyes, in this scene she is wearing more grown up clothing and is covered almost in red to symbolise sensuality, lust or a more mature tone. It's as if as during the time she was missing the rock opened up a gateway into her womanhood and made her more mature, as if she had experienced something repressed or sensual on the rock.

Illustration -

Figure 1. Picnic at Hanging Rock - 1975 - [Movie Poster]
Figure 2. Picnic at Hanging Rock - 1975 - [Movie Still]
Figure 3. Picnic at Hanging Rock - 1975 - [Movie Still]

Bibliography:

Ebert, Roger 1998 - PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK At: https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-picnic-at-hanging-rock-1975 [Accessed: 10/05/18]

Nathan, Ian 2000 - Picnic at Hanging Rock Review At: https://www.empireonline.com/movies/picnic-hanging-rock/review/