Sunday 24 July, 4pm
The iconic Ritz Cinemas, Randwick will celebrate its 85th birthday with a bang. Sydney’s home of film is ready for the future of moviegoing with a stunning surrealist-inspired renovation, the addition of 3 new cinemas, and its biggest program of retrospectives ever.
To celebrate this milestone 85th birthday, the Ritz will host a birthday party on Sunday 24 July – almost 85 years to the day since it opened – which includes a special gala screening of a new 4K restoration of A Star Is Born (1937), released the same year, followed by a party 85 years in the making.
Festivities will include speeches, entertainment, food and drinks, and the chance to explore the Ritz’s new renovations with a champagne in hand. Tickets for this special event are on sale now.
The Ritz 85th Birthday Party – A Star is Reborn
Sunday 24 July
5pm Screening
7pm 85th Birthday Party including food and drinks.
85 Films in 85 Days
Sunday 24 July to Sunday 16 October, 2022
The Ritz will celebrate 85 years of uninterrupted cinemagoing with its biggest retrospective ever, with 85 films screening in 85 consecutive days, one film representing each year the Ritz has been open. Select sessions will screen in 35mm, 70mm and 4K formats.
The retrospective begins with A Star is Born (1937) and an 85th birthday party on Sunday 24 July. Following this, the Ritz will guide audiences through a history of cinema with famous films that have graced its screens.
The retrospective begins in the 1930s, over the Technicolor rainbow, with The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) and The Wizard of Oz (1939).
Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, audiences will have the opportunity to see some of the greatest films ever made, from the Golden Age of Hollywood and beyond, including Citizen Kane (1941), Casablanca (1942), Black Narcissus (1947) and Bicycle Thieves (1948).
The 1950s see an explosion of world cinema with revered classics like Rashomon (1950), Tokyo Story (1953) and La Strada (1954), while the 1960s sees a stylistic shift from polished epics like West Side Story (1961) and Lawrence of Arabia (1962) to scrappy and subversive New Hollywood stories like Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Midnight Cowboy (1969).
In the 1970s, the auteur reigns supreme with Robert Altman’s MASH (1970), Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show (1971) and Terrence Malick’s Badlands (1973), before the blockbuster takes hold in the 1980s, with Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Blade Runner (1982) and Back to the Future (1985).
Cult classics dominate the 1990s, with screenings of Pulp Fiction (1994), Clueless (1995) and Trainspotting (1997), while enduring independent gems like In the Mood for Love (2000), Lost in Translation (2003) and Pan’s Labyrinth (2008) weave a thread through the first decade of the new millenium.
Audiences can revisit recent favourites like Frances Ha (2012), Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) and Get Out (2018) before the Ritz presents the very first Australian screening of A24’s The Green Knight (2021) to finish off its mammoth retrospective and birthday celebration.
The 85 Films in 85 Days calendar can be downloaded from the Ritz website here.
85 Film in 85 Days
Daily from Sunday 24 July
Check the website for screening times.
PUTTIN’ ON THE RITZ SINCE 1937
