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Between a funeral parlour and a sink factory, a queue of cars slowly disappears down a driveway. Most arrive with plenty of time to spare – to turn their backseats into beds, tune their radios to the film audio and let children play on the bitumen or finish their takeaway dinner. By the time darkness falls, hundreds of cars are pointed towards a screen that has outlived almost every other drive-in in Melbourne.
“There’s something about watching a film under the stars, in the night air,” says Michael O’Neill, a car detailer who lives in Echuca, a five-hour return trip from the Coburg Drive-In.
At the peak of their popularity, there were more than 300 drive-in cinemas in Australia. Now, the Coburg Drive-In is the last one left within an hour of the Melbourne CBD.
O’Neil has been coming to the drive-in for 20 years, and when the light-up sign comes into view, it’s not unlike the feeling of coming home. He visits monthly.
People back home have often jeered, telling him it’s a waste of time. But O’Neill finds the traditional cinema experience lacklustre, “sat in a dark room, with phones buzzing and people talking”. He wants to live the drive-in experience while he can.
“We just don’t know – it could continue,” he says. “But if the end does come with the Coburg Drive-in, you can’t say I didn’t have a good run out of it.”
Factoring in petrol, a night out at the drive-in will cost O’Neill about $150 – the equivalent, he says, to a night out in Echuca’s pubs and clubs, which he finds “too rough”.
“I feel safe and happy here.”
The drive-in demands little of its audience. You can lie down, walk around, talk and sing without fear of being hushed. Parents feel at ease bringing newborns, and dogs can curl up beside their owners.
For Sylvaine Moses, it has been a safe haven for decades as a place to bring her son, Jamie, who lives with multiple disabilities. “This was the only place we could come as a family without feeling self-conscious about disturbing others,” she says.
During films, there is a steady trickle of people wandering between the retro diner, playground and toilet block. The biggest breach of etiquette seems to be someone forgetting to switch off their headlights.
Te, 29, a Coburg local, often arrives in her van with her dog Ellie.
“It’s a nice place for me when I’m having a bad mental health day, and I’ve brought friends when they’re having a tough week,” she says.
Much has changed in the Coburg industrial area that the drive-in calls home. For many parents, though, the unchanged landscape inside the gates feels like a time carousel. Bringing their own children here feels like stepping back into their own childhood.
Keziah Gillam was surprised when her 13-year-old daughter Callie asked about going to the drive-in with her best friends after the group saw them in retro films and TV shows like The Outsiders.
“It had this middle-of-nowhere feel, and it’s kind of outdoors but you’re cosy in your car with blankets. It means we can cuddle up,” Callie says.
“I thought I’ll never get the opportunity to visit one,” adds her friend Colin, a first-timer.
Outside the gates, time has not stood still. Local historians say patrons used to be told to lock their doors when there was an escape from the nearby Pentridge prison.
Now, the former prison has undergone a billion-dollar redevelopment into apartments and an entertainment precinct. The eight-hectare concrete parcel the drive-in sits on was sold for $12.5m to an investor in 2018, with Village Cinemas leasing the property back for 10 years as part of the deal.
Whether the site will operate as a drive-in beyond 2028 is unclear.
“Having a drive-in in our portfolio of cinemas is important to us and we’re committed to ensuring that experience continues,” says Andrew Howell, general manager of operations at Village Cinemas.
However, the company would not confirm whether a decision had been made about the Coburg site’s future after the current lease expires.
The last picture show
Across the back of several Village Cinemas staff jackets at the drive-in is stitched the words: “The Last Picture Show.”
Many have worked together for years; on busy nights they serve food and popcorn and jumpstart cars – something all the staff are trained to do. Some winter nights, staff have helped revive the dead batteries of about 30 cars.
Stephen, who asked to keep his surname private, has spent almost three decades working in cinemas. Over his years at the drive-in he has seen marriage proposals and heartbreak – “one guy discovered his wife in a car with another man”.
He went front-of-house when his job as projectionist ceased to exist in 2013 – the technology no longer required humans to thread film reels. Now in his late 60s, he suspects the drive-in will be the last job he has before he retires.
O’Neill, meanwhile, suspects the Coburg Drive-In is the last one he’ll ever be able to drive to regularly from his home.
“If it ever goes, a part of me will be gone forever but I’ll have to accept it.” For him, he says, “it would be like accepting the death of a loved one”.
English (US) ·