Dome Under Fulldome Festival

Overview

For more than a century, watching a movie has involved staring at either a rectangle or a square. They're the shapes that the silver screen is known for, and the small screen as well. But catch a film at the planetarium and everything becomes circular — which makes fulldome flicks, as they're called, something particularly special.

Melbourne Planetarium plays movies on its dome via regular programs — films specifically made to take advantage of the different screening format — and the Melbourne International Film Festival has included fulldome showcases in its annual lineup. But Australia only boasts one film fest that's solely all about hemispherical views. That event: the Dome Under Film Festival, which debuted in 2020 before the pandemic, and returns to the Victorian capital across Friday, January 31–Sunday, February 2, 2025.

Dome Under Festival's latest outing once again sees the best new fulldome releases from around the world head to Scienceworks. With sessions dedicated to family-friendly titles, astronomy, art, world stories and the future, the program features plenty of highlights — covering everything from the moons of mars, Antarctica, dinosaurs, total solar eclipses and complex life forms through to cosmic events, cats in space and time slowing down.

In total, 32 films from 15 countries will grace the dome, as handpicked by the Dome Under team. Each one will fill every inch of the planetarium's 16-metre domed ceiling — and play with 5.1 surround sound.