NZ film news, reviews, discussion, appreciation.
Utu (1983)
With an ambitious scale rarely seen from the cinema of New Zealand, at least until Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings saga thrust the nation fully into the spotlight, Geoff Murphy’s Utu is - for many reasons - a pioneering film.
continue reading . . . Deathgasm (2015)
It feels like we’ve been waiting forever to see Deathgasm, winner of the 2013 Make My Horror Movie contest. After earning promising reviews from a number of festivals around the globe, writer-director Jason Lei Howden has finally returned with his creation - an enjoyable if not especially remarkable entry into NZ’s storied splatter-comedy canon.
continue reading . . . Ever the Land (2015)
It’s NZ International Film Festival time, so that means it’s time for some niche and very specific Kiwi documentaries to have their brief time in the sun. In 2015’s Aotearoa section there are no less than 11 documentary features, including Sarah Grohnert’s Ever the Land which we were lucky enough to have an early look at.
continue reading . . . I'll Make You Happy (1999)
It’s always interesting, if not always the most fun, to look back at the major releases in the years between the early NZ cinema boom of the late 70s-early 80s and the next big wave riding on the back of Lord of the Rings. There were bright spots here and there, but there’s also a lot of movies where, in hindsight, it’s just baffling that they garnered the amount of attention and talent that they did.
continue reading . . . Death Warmed Up (1984)
There can be little argument that David Blyth is right amongst the most fringe filmmakers New Zealand has produced - he may in fact sit atop the throne of that particular niche realm. His work (including previously reviewed works Angel Mine and Wound) occupies a dark recess of NZ cinema, one bursting with unbridled subversion and id-driven mania which is often unpleasant but always unique.
continue reading . . . Saving Grace (1998)
It’s never precisely clear what director Costa Botes (adapting the stage play from Duncan Sarkies) is getting at with Saving Grace, but it makes for an interesting watch anyway. Equal parts unconventional romance, religious fantasy and mental illness study, the film benefits from a strict focus on well-performed characters and emotionally turbulent story - even if it’s thematic resolution could have been tightened up.
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Born to Dance (2015)
The once-maligned dance film genre has had a shot in the arm over the past decade or so, largely thanks to the Step Up franchise, with some claiming that the energetic choreography has thus far provided the only truly worthy use of 3-D technology. While not in 3-D, first-time director Tammy Davis’ Born to Dance offers a typically Kiwi spin on the dance flick formula.
continue reading . . . Turbo Kid (2015)
Riding the recent wave of VHS-era nostalgia right in to its apocalyptic shore, Canadian/NZ co-production Turbo Kid pulls influence from John Carpenter, George Miller and other proponents of trashy violence and synth soundtracks into a fun, gore-soaked throwback that’s light on story but delivers plenty of schlock delights.
continue reading . . . Ghost Shark 2: Urban Jaws (2015)
It took six years, had its title all-but stolen out from under it by the SyFy Network, and allegedly almost destroyed the two creative minds behind it, but after all that toil Ghost Shark 2: Urban Jaws is here. It’s short, it’s rough around the edges, but boy is it fun - a cult classic in the making the likes of which we haven’t seen in New Zealand for far too long.
continue reading . . . I Survived a Zombie Holocaust
Pitching itself as the first NZ zombie film since Peter Jackson’s Braindead, Guy Pigden’s I Survived a Zombie Holocaust has finally been unleashed after a years-long post-production schedule. Unfortunately all that time in the editing suite can’t salvage a decent film out of a script bogged down with juvenile humour, tired genre tropes and increasingly obnoxious meta in-jokes likely to deter large segments of the audience.
continue reading . . . The Ground We Won (2015)
If one were to gather a list of things that are fundamentally Kiwi, rugby and farming - particularly dairy over the last decade - would be somewhere right near the top. Which makes it surprising that the two haven’t been brought together on film before, at least not in the manner of The Ground We Won, Christopher Pryor and Miriam Smith’s paean to rural NZ masculinity which follows the formerly hapless Reporoa Rugby Club throughout their comeback season.
continue reading . . . Hot Target (1985)
Given the relatively small catalogue of New Zealand cinema, it’s not often that you come across something which seems to be unknown and undiscussed. Things do occasionally slip through the cracks though, which is apparently the case with 1985’s Hot Target, an early example of Hollywood coming to our shores to make use of our locations and talent.
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