The ANU Film Group will have an intermission of more than seven months when the Kambri Cultural Centre, where its screenings are held, is closed in June for roof repairs necessitated by the January 2020 hailstorm.
As the 2024 academic year approaches, the Australian National University's Hail Remediation Team has been continuing the repairs to more than 160 buildings that began in May 2022, a spokesperson said.
Most of the work was expected to be completed by October 2024 but some more complex repairs will be finished by mid-2025.
The spokesperson said the university had worked with its community and other key stakeholders who used the campus.
It was carrying out remediation works in a staged way so that key teaching, research and public engagement activities could continue with as little disruption as possible.
The ANU Film Group's president, Adrian Ma, said he had been told last year the Kambri Centre would be closed in the middle of 2024 and was expected to reopen in time for Orientation Week in February 2025.
Mr Ma said the university had tried to help the group find an alternative venue on campus but none had the equipment necessary for screenings.
The university had consulted the group in the building of the theatre, its home since 2019, where it has screened films up to four nights a week.
The group's previous location in the university was no longer suitable for technical reasons, Mr Ma said.
While the prolonged closure was disappointing, he understood the importance of repairing the Kambri Centre.
"It needs to happen," Mr Ma said.
He said the group, which began in 1966, had survived a nine-month closure during COVID and it now had about 1000 members who would be offered refunds or extended memberships as happened during the previous hiatus.
"We'll be back," Mr Ma said.
The group will screen "at least 65 films" in the time it has available, Mr Ma said.
"We'll show as much as we can," he said.
The first film to be screened will be the anime feature The Boy and the Heron on February 12 during Orientation Week.
There will be a mix of short films and features from around the world including some previously unseen in Australia with support from embassies.
Anniversary screenings of films will include Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window and Elia Kazan's On the Waterfront (both from 1954) and Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction (1994).
Some events, including the ANU/The Canberra Times Meet the Author talks and Canberra Writers Festival programming, will be relocated during the year.
Canberra Writers Festival chair Jane O'Dwyer said the ANU had been "a really important part of the festival" since it began in 2015. Events held at the ANU had always moved around among different venues, Ms O'Dwyer said, depending on their size, student needs and other considerations - such as the repairs.
"We'll work out what's available and which venues work," she said.
- ANU Film Group: anufg.org.au
- Meet the Author: anu.edu.au/events
- Canberra Writers Festival: canberrawritersfestival.com.au
