At its peak in 1970, South Australia had nine drive-in movie theatres.
There’s now only one place left in South Australia where you can watch a film from your car under an open sky, and it’s worth the drive to get there.
The Coober Pedy Drive-In launched a monthly Retro Classics program in late June 2026, screening films from the golden age of cinema in what is arguably Australia’s most extraordinary outdoor setting. Jaws kicked off the series; further titles will be announced monthly via the drive-in’s website and Facebook page.
For those who went to the drive-ins that once populated suburban and regional South Australia, the program offers something more than a night out, it’s a chance to step back into a ritual that’s largely vanished. For anyone who missed them the first time around, Coober Pedy might be a first.
The roughly nine-hour drive from Adelaide is, as the organisers point out, very much part of the experience, stay a few nights, explore the underground homes and opal fields of Coober Pedy, and finish with a classic film and the kind of sky you won’t see from the city.
“We want people to see the distance from Adelaide as the invitation,” says Margaret Wood of the Coober Pedy Drive-In. ‘You cannot recreate that in a city cinema.’
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