Bowen Cinema To Host Two World Space Week Activities

Bowen Summergarden Cinema will celebrate World Space Week 2025 with a children and youth poster competition and screenings of To The Stars – Beginning, a feature documentary about the early years of Gilmour Space Technologies.

Both events are officially registered Australian activities for World Space Week, which runs from October 4–10 each year. The 2025 theme is Living In Space.

Cinema owner Ben DeLuca said the poster competition invites entrants to pick a planet or planetary moon within the solar system, then design a way to reach it and live there.

“We now have the Bowen Orbital Spaceport so it might get local kids thinking of careers in space and the space industry,” he said.

Entries can be dropped into the cinema until October 1. All posters will be displayed in the foyer during World Space Week, with a ballot to determine the winner on October 5, just before the final screening of To The Stars – Beginning at 7pm. The winner will receive a Bowen Cinema family pass of six tickets and a DVD of the documentary.

“Entries can then be picked up at the conclusion of World Space Week 2025 after October 10th,” Mr DeLuca said. He added that patrons will also have the chance to vote for the best entries, with two small prizes awarded to the top primary and high school posters.

The screenings mark a belated premiere for To The Stars – Beginning, produced by Queensland independent filmmaker Robin Williams of RP Williams Films. The documentary covers the origins of Gilmour Space Technologies, founded by brothers Adam and James Gilmour.

“Like many people my age I was a space nerd and grew up during the Apollo Moon Missions,” Ms Williams said. Filming began in 2017, before Australia had its own Space Agency. The Gilmour footage was completed in 2019, but post-production was delayed by COVID.

“Because of so much uncertainty with lockdowns we entered a few festivals – that resulted in a Best Feature Documentary win at the 2021 Sanctuary Film Festival – held a Cast and Crew screening and one theatrical screening in Brisbane then followed professional advise and ‘put it on the shelf’ until things returned to normal,” she said.

The Bowen screenings have been timed to coincide with Gilmour’s major milestone, the Eris 1 launch attempt.

“So I guess you could call these Bowen screenings a belated official Premiere of To The Stars – Beginning,” Ms Williams said.

Mr DeLuca said the cinema is proud to host the film.

“This is a true story of inspiration about Australian brothers who have already made Australian history and it’s made by independent Australian documentary makers,” he said.

Adam Gilmour said, “Not many people know this about our company, but before Eris there was a much smaller suborbital rocket called One Vision. It was a simpler time back then, but fraught with its own challenges.”

James Gilmour, now based in Bowen, said he has always loved space.

“How can you not look up at the night sky and wonder?”

‍

Key talent and creative at a private cast and crew screening of To The Stars- Beginning, Paul Williams, Adam Gilmour, James Gilmour, and Robin Williams

Ben DeLuca outside his iconic Bowen Cinema

Photos supplied

‍