Drive-in cinemas have had their nostalgia moment. Now a Maldivian resort has swapped the car park for a lagoon. Siyam World, part of the Sun Siyam group's Lifestyle Collection, has launched JetCar Cinema — a floating movie experience where guests pilot a JetCar across the water, park up under the night sky, and watch a film on a big screen that floats on the lagoon itself.
Each session takes up to four people, and the film, drinks and popcorn are all included. So the format is familiar: arrive, settle in, snacks down, lights out. It's just that your vehicle glides rather than rolls, and the view before the trailers start involves warm Indian Ocean water instead of a car park barrier.
The concept fits the resort's pattern of taking a standard holiday perk and pushing it somewhere odd. Siyam World already claims the Maldives' largest floating waterpark, the country's first horse ranch inside a resort, and its own electric go-kart track. JetCar Cinema slots neatly into that line-up — part mini-adventure, part cinema trip, with the ride across the lagoon built in as half the fun.
It's pitched squarely at couples after a date night that doesn't involve another candlelit beach dinner, though a family of four could just as easily make an evening of it. And for anyone collecting holiday stories to tell back home, watching a blockbuster from the middle of a lagoon is a solid entry.
The wider Maldives resort scene is clearly leaning into bigger, more themed experiences this season. Reethi Faru has rolled out a full festive programme mixing gingerbread workshops and a New Year's gala with coral planting alongside a marine biologist. Banyan Tree Vabbinfaru is running 'The Secret Underwater Garden' from 22 December 2026 to 7 January 2027, built around its marine lab with coral-planting ceremonies, Bodu Beru drumming nights and an island-to-island swim. Movie night on the water is simply the newest entry in a season where Maldivian resorts are competing to make even downtime feel like an event.
If you're already booked at Siyam World, JetCar Cinema is an easy add-on for one evening — book a session early in your stay so you can slot in a backup if the weather turns. Pair it with the waterpark by day and you've got a genuinely full itinerary without leaving the island. For everyone else, it's one more reason the Maldives in 2026 is about far more than overwater villas and snorkelling: the resorts are now competing on entertainment as much as scenery.
