A Canberra cinephile’s winter survival guide: three months of fabulous film at the NFSA

Posted on 20 May, 2026

Canberra winter does strange things to people. You start cancelling plans based entirely on parking distance. Leaving the house after dark becomes a major commitment.

But the idea of sitting somewhere warm for three hours while somebody else’s problems unfold on a giant screen sounds pretty appealing. Which is where the National Film and Sound Archive’s Winter Film Series comes in.

Running across June, July and August, Arc Cinema’s winter programme leans hard into films that bend time, fracture reality, revisit memory and transport you somewhere else entirely – whether that’s deep space, 1960s Paris, alien-infested spacecraft or a perfectly strange late-night double feature with mulled wine in hand.

‘Our Winter program emerged from conversations about how audiences experience time today – fragmented and accelerated – and by cinema’s unique ability to bend time and space in ways no other artform can,’ said Alice Taylor, the NFSA’s Creative Producer.

‘We hope audiences leave our beautiful Arc Cinema inspired to reimagine their time and place in the world.’

Choose your own adventure. Here’s a taste of what’s in store.

FOR COMFORT VIEWING

Want comfort cinema? Groundhog Day screens Sunday 7 June, The Lion King sing-along arrives Sunday 28 June, and the full Back to the Future marathon runs Saturday 27 June – one of the most enjoyable ways to spend nine consecutive winter hours in Canberra. If you’ve never seen all three back-to-back, this is the year.

FOR PEOPLE WHO ENJOY QUESTIONING REALITY

Prefer your cinema existential? There’s a mind-bending line-up to choose from.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Thursday 25 June) screens before things properly spiral in July with Predestination and Total Recall on Friday 10 July.

Then comes Christopher Nolan’s full winter marathon on Saturday 25 July: Memento (2 pm), Inception (4:30 pm) and Interstellar (7:30 pm) back-to-back – nine straight hours of fractured memory, dream logic, space-time theory and increasingly intense emotional damage.

That not enough for you? La Jetée + Sans Soleil screens Sunday 21 June, while August brings The Time Masters and Je t’aime, je t’aime (Friday 7 August), 12 Monkeys (Friday 14 August) and Solaris (Saturday 22 August) – films for people who enjoy leaving the cinema questioning the linear nature of time. Snacks and wine can be purchased from Dom’s deli and bar onsite; perfect for helping you work through your existential crisis.

CULT CHAOS ENERGY

If you love cult chaos, you’re in for a treat. Scanners (Friday 31 July), Body Double (Friday 21 August) and Event Horizon (Thursday 27 August) all make appearances through the season, hosted by local drag artist and culture warrior Venus Mantrap. Celebrating cult cinema in all its daring and stylish glory, each session includes a unique, pre-screening introduction and live performance. Meanwhile – if that’s not enough – Mars Attacks! (Friday 12 June) brings a slightly campier kind of weirdness.

And then there’s the full Alien marathon on Saturday 15 August: Alien (4 pm), Aliens (6:30 pm) and Alien³ (9:30 pm) back-to-back for anyone wanting their winter cinema experience to involve existential dread, immaculate production design and at least one moment of absolute terror.

The Friday night double features are a great night out – curated pairings designed for late night dates (and ticket discounts).

The Before Sunrise and Before Sunset pairing on Friday 19 June might be the romantic highlight of the season – depending, of course, on how emotionally stable you currently are.

Meanwhile, Barbarella and Planet of the Apes (Friday 24 July) deliver peak retro sci-fi energy: camp, chaos, questionable future predictions and an excellent excuse to stay up late.

MORE THAN MOVIES

If you’re someone who likes talking about the film afterwards almost as much as watching it, the Winter Film Series goes beyond the screen with a rich line-up of events.

Queer Flicks launches as a new monthly series this winter, creating space to connect before the screening even starts. It opens Thursday 2 July with Lesbian Space Princess and a Q&A with director Leela Varghese, before Paris is Burning screens on 35mm Thursday 6 August – the landmark 1990 documentary about New York’s ballroom scene, as powerful now as when it was made.

Book Club at NFSA returns in partnership with 666 ABC Radio Canberra, pairing film adaptations with post-screening conversations led by Alice Matthews and author Rhiân Williams. This season’s line-up: The Book Thief (Sunday 14 June), Desert Hearts (Sunday 26 July), and The Outsiders: The Complete Novel (Director’s Cut) on Sunday 16 August.

If you’ve ever sat in a cinema and thought but what does it mean – and wanted someone to actually dig into that with you – Science. Art. Film. is your series.

Each month this winter, ANU scholars, researchers and artists gather around a carefully chosen film for the kind of conversation that spills well beyond the credits. Moderated by Dr Anna-Sophie Jürgens, the series opens with Close Encounters of the Third Kind on Wednesday 17 June – Spielberg’s awe-struck vision of alien contact, and a rich jumping-off point for questions about science, belief and the unknown. Then on Wednesday 26 August, the gloriously strange Ruben Brandt, Collector brings an art-world thriller that’s as visually inventive as it is thought-provoking.

The $8 Collection Selection screenings pair archival Australian films with post-screening Q&As at a price that makes a Sunday afternoon at the cinema a good investment. This winter’s line-up includes In the Wake of the Bounty (Saturday 4 July), The Picture Show Man (Saturday 20 June) and Dad and Dave Come to Town (Saturday 22 August).

And for anyone who considers a 35mm screening a reason to rearrange their weekend: Modern Times screens Sunday 2 August, Rashomon Thursday 13 August, and Citizen Kane closes out the season on Sunday 30 August. Three films that shaped cinema, the way they were meant to be seen.

THE Q&AS WORTH LEAVING THE HOUSE FOR

The Q&A programme across the season is quietly stacked. NAIDOC Week brings The Colleano Heart on Sunday 5 July with filmmaker and NFSA Head of First Nations Engagement Pauline Clague.

My Life Without Steve screens on Thursday 23 July with director Gillian Leahy. Dogs in Space celebrates 40 years with director Richard Lowenstein joining the conversation on Saturday 1 August.

And during National Science Week in August, radio astronomer Mark Price joins a post-screening discussion of The Dish on Sunday 23 August – one of the few people actually present at the Parkes radio telescope during the Apollo 11 Moon Landing. What the film gets right, what really happened: it’s inside knowledge no amount of googling can replicate.

MAKE A NIGHT OF IT

Warm cinema, good films, Dom’s hot chocolate and mulled wine, and nowhere else you need to be for a few hours? Canberra winters could do worse.

Somewhere between a Nolan marathon, a late-night French sci-fi double and an unexpectedly emotional Book Club screening, three months of chilly days and nights suddenly feel a little easier to deal with.

Images supplied.