Overview
The much-anticipated Downtown Drive-In has been announced, and it knocks all of Sydney’s other outdoor movie theatres (no mean feat) right out of the car park. Over three consecutive nights from 29 November - 1 December, Carriageworks will be the backdrop for a regrettably short season of alfresco films falling under the simultaneously announced theme 'Back Roads USA'.
The season will offer viewers something new, something sentimental and something excavated from the mine of cinematic classics. On The Road will transport viewers from a 120-year-old heritage building to the dusty golden age of roadside America on November 29, before John Hughes' delightfully catastrophic 1987 travelog Plains, Trains and Automobiles on the Friday. The season will close with a screening of minimalist chase film Vanishing Point (1971), which is a bit like Fast and the Furious only easier to follow, nicer to look at and five hundred times better.
There will also be plenty of opportunities to play tribute to the films through cheesy, meaty deliciousness, as Sydney’s favourite American-style diner The Dip will design a custom menu for the affair. Cinema-quality digital projection will bring the lost world of drive-in cinema firmly into the present and Audi will also supply a range of luxury cars for the ultimate drive-in experience, featuring Bang & Olufsen sound systems to ensure crystal audio even if you’re munching pickles like they’re popcorn.
As promised entry will be $50 per vehicle or $25 per person for deckchair seating. It's also undercover, because if you've been outside this week you'll know a Sydney spring can be kind of unpredictable.