Sam Neill, Tom Cruise, and a Ballarat winter of big-screen wonders

Ballarat's love affair with the big screen is getting an adrenaline shot this winter. The Ballarat Civic Hall, the only regional Victorian venue screening Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey in the director's preferred 70mm format, has reported a surge of interstate bookings since the film opened on 10 July.

The Guardian reported on Monday that Nolan fans are "embarking on epic journeys" to see the film as he intended, and Ballarat's historic 600-seat auditorium has become an unlikely mecca. Civic Hall manager Ruth Pendelbury told the paper the venue had taken calls from as far as Brisbane and Adelaide, with some patrons booking flights and accommodation for a single screening.

From Sturt Street to the Strait of Hormuz

The film's release coincides with a week of extraordinary headlines. While the US has pledged to "guard" the Strait of Hormuz after a ceasefire with Iran collapsed, and the Prime Minister prepares a major speech on AI, Ballarat's cultural calendar offers a more ancient brand of storytelling. Nolan's The Odyssey, a $250-million adaptation of Homer's epic, runs 2 hours 55 minutes and includes a mid-film intermission, a rarity in modern cinema.

Local cinephiles have seized the opportunity. The Ballarat Film Society, which meets monthly at the Civic Hall, organised a members-only double-bill on Saturday 18 July, The Odyssey at 2pm followed by a restored print of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey at 6.30pm. Tickets for the double-bill sold out within 48 hours, according to the society's president, Mark O'Brien.

Further down Sturt Street, the Regent Cinema is offering a counter-program. Its 4K digital projection of Digger, the upcoming Tom Cruise film in which the star is almost unrecognisable as a World War I sapper, has been drawing strong weekday matinee crowds. The trailer dropped on 14 July and shows Cruise with a shaved head, a prosthetic scar across his left temple, and no visible stunt work. SMH described the role as "like nothing he's done before".

Sam Neill's dream, and a full winter program

Sam Neill, the New Zealand-born actor who made his home in regional Victoria and serves as patron of the Ballarat International Foto Biennale, shared his "dream" project with SMH on the same day. Neill told the paper he wants to direct a feature-length documentary on the life of the Australian botanist and Eureka stockade veteran, Ferdinand von Mueller. No timeline or budget has been announced, but the suggestion has stirred interest among Ballarat's heritage community.

The winter arts program doesn't stop at cinema. The Ballarat Art Gallery on Lydiard Street is hosting its annual winter exhibition, Light & Dark, featuring 42 works from the permanent collection, including pieces by Tom Roberts, Clarice Beckett, and the late Ballarat-born photographer John Cato. Entry is free for locals on weekends until the exhibition closes on 23 August.

For the budget-conscious, the Civic Hall offers $12 bargain matinees every Tuesday at 1pm, including a screening of The Odyssey on 21 July. Seats for the Tuesday session, the hall confirmed, are still available.

What happens next depends on demand. If The Odyssey continues to draw visitors from outside town, the Civic Hall may extend its run beyond the scheduled end date of 6 August. The Film Society has already submitted a request to the council for a further two weeks. In the meantime, the message for Ballarat locals is simple: book early, or risk being left out of the odyssey.