cinematography

"Picnic at Hanging Rock" was lauded for cinematography after it release, winning a BAFTA award in 1977 and receiving other nominations. The filmmakers had a lot of breathtaking features to work with, from Hanging Rock to the wild outback to the incongruity of the prim, colonial schoolhouse, an isolated piece of civilization set against the fields.

But Australia's natural beauty wasn't what made the cinematography so extraordinary. The play of the camera on the rock made it a living character. The use of a bridal veil over the lens gave some of the schoolgirl scenes an ethereal and dreamlike quality.

Several articles about Weir, including Wikipedia's, cite his interest in contrasting a microcosm and macrocosm, with characters moving into the macrocosm with mixed results — in "Picnic at Hanging Rock," "Dead Poet's Society" and "The Truman Show." "Picnic's" cinematography is essential to establishing this idea of what happens when the girls leave their civilized, gilded cage and have a chance to explore the real world.