Each year the New Zealand International Film Festival brings gay-themed movies to an audience. David Herkt explores this history, what it means, and one of this year’s featured movies. A personal history is also, inevitably, a history of movies seen. Exploration of one’s own sexual desires will often occur through movie characters and movie plots. … Read more
Philippa Campbell introduces the second series of Jane Campion’s Top of the Lake and Hugh Macdonald gets outdoors in a different way. Part six of our Film Festival filmmaker’s choice series. Producer Philippa Campbell on Top of the Lake: China Girl and her recommended movie, We Don’t Need a Map Top of the Lake: China Girl screened … Read more
Director Annie Goldson introduces her Dotcom documentary and the one she calls its antithesis; and Julian Boshier talks about working with Wellington band Head Like a Hole for 15 years. Welcome to part five of our Film Festival filmmaker’s choice series. Kim Dotcom director Annie Goldson recommends Waru I’m really keen to see Waru, possibly because it’s … Read more
Who doesn’t like a bracingly funny bit of satirical social politics? Who doesn’t admire an arts troupe that astounds its audience show after show? With the Film Festival upon us we asked filmmakers to choose a favourite movie from the lineup and also tell us about their own films in the festival. Here’s the fourth … Read more
We asked filmmakers to choose a favourite from the Film Festival lineup and also tell us about their own films. This third instalment of the series features Gaylene Preston, Renae Maihi, Paul Oremland and Jackie van Beek. Gaylene Preston, director of My Year with Helen, recommends Faces Places Faces Places is the film I most want … Read more
We asked filmmakers to choose a favourite from the Film Festival lineup and also tell us about their own films in the festival. In this second instalment of the series, Florian Habicht explains his scary movie with ‘more heart than horror’, Nic Gorman ties his sub-Antarctic thriller to the dystopian Russian classic Stalker and Simon … Read more
With the Film Festival now underway we asked we asked a whole bunch of filmmakers to tell us about a film they’re specially keen to see, and about their own film too. Here’s the first instalment: Paul Wolffram, Katie Wolfe and Robin Greenberg. What Lies That Way director Paul Wolffram recommends Maliglutit I’m looking forward to … Read more
Rising Hollywood star Ansel Elgort has a reputation for being kind of bad. Madeleine Chapman met him to find out the truth. Ansel Elgort sounds like a douchebag. He’s 23 and famous, with a Vogue photographer for a dad and an opera director for a mum. He grew up rich in New York and skipped all … Read more
Is Cars 3 a stealth feminist smash hit? Mum of three Angela Cuming gives her verdict on a franchise that has never been very good in the past. I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with Pixar films. As in I’ve hated how much people have loved them because to me they’ve always been a testimony … Read more
Residents of rural towns are facing astronomical bills to support basic infrastructure. In Glenorchy, a mecca for film and tourism, they’re mad as hell and not going to take it any more, writes Peter Newport. User pays. Sounds fair doesn’t it? You use – you pay. But for many small towns around New Zealand being … Read more
A new film depicting the extraordinary contribution of African-American women at Nasa during the space race offers a powerful and timely reminder of the contributions to science of people whose stories are too often hidden from view, writes Kate Hannah Last weekend, Hidden Figures knocked the Star Wars universe film Rogue One off top place … Read more
Chris Ingam is not the only parent who has the shits with Pixar after seeing the trailer for Cars 3. The graphic car crash that comprises the trailer suggests hero to many children Lightening McQueen has carked it. Chris asks the hard questions – can cars die and why the Hell do they need to … Read more
Disney have once again come under fire for cultural appropriation, this time for the release of their Maui costume for kids. Madeleine Chapman explains why it might not be so bad. Mulan is my favourite movie. Not my favourite Disney movie or even my favourite children’s movie. Mulan is my favourite movie, period. I’ve seen … Read more
Undertaking the yearly challenge that is digesting the New Zealand International Film Festival line-up, Alex Casey from The Spinoff and Steve Newall from Flicks team up with notorious film festival fan Matthew Crawley to chew over the 2016 programme. Every. Last. Word of it. With their new mate Terry that they picked up in a … Read more
Once Were Warriors, released in 1994, shocked the world with brutal scenes of domestic violence, suicide and rape. As director Lee Tamahori prepares for the release of his first New Zealand film since that break-out hit, Elizabeth Beattie looks back at the New Zealand it depicted and asks, how much has really changed? Trigger Warning: … Read more
Quentin Tarantino called Geoff Murphy’s 1983 film Utu “hands down the best New Zealand movie of all time” while in Auckland this week to promote The Hateful Eight. In this essay, republished with the kind permission of NZ On Screen, Paul Stanley Ward and Costa Botes look back on the landmark piece of New Zealand cinema. … Read more