Jonathan Dennis and Jan Bieringa, eds
Film in Aotearoa New Zealand
Wellington, NZ: Victoria University of Wellington Press, 1996
2nd edition
ISBN: 0 86473 309 7
NZ$49.95 (pb)
244 pp

Given the paucity of writing on cinema in Aotearoa New Zealand, the publication of Film in Aotearoa New Zealand in its original edition in 1992 was a major event for film culture in this country. Its republication in 1996 is again a major event.

Film culture here has developed unevenly, whether framed in terms of geographical, economic, ethnic, or aesthetic concerns. The uniqueness of this anthology left it open to inevitable attacks for its original omissions. The second edition remains much as before, only more so as a result of the changes (one essay out, new material in, largely for purposes of updating the volume since The Piano [Jane Campion, 1993], Heavenly Creatures [Peter Jackson, 1994], and Once Were Warriors [Lee Tamahori, 1994] appeared). The increased focus works to the anthology’s advantage, enhancing its coherence and expanding the approaches taken by contributors to the material in question.

The loss of one essay (Mary Varnham’s “Desperately seeking to see ourselves,” about television and national identity in Aotearoa New Zealand) and the addition of sixteen pages has meant the inclusion of four new essays and small expansions in Jonathan Dennis’ timeline at the end of the book and in my colleague Russell Campbell’s essay (“Eight documentaries” has become “Nine documentaries,” with the new film being Gaylene Preston’s War Stories our Mothers Never Told Us [1995]).

Another change, in the cover illustration, indicates a large difference in the state of affairs for filmmaking here. For the first edition, the editors used an image from John O’Shea’s  Broken Barrier (1952); the second edition has matching portraits of Beth (Rena Owen) and Jake (Temuera Morrison) from Lee Tamahori’s  Once were Warriors. The change suggests an equal change in attitude: from looking back at a past to be proud of, Kiwi filmmakers can confidently look forward to other, future triumphs.

There are fourteen essays and a lengthy timeline in Film in Aotearoa New Zealand, along with 30 color and 240 black and white illustrations. The former include several reproductions of oil paintings by Colin McCahon, arguably Aotearoa New Zealand’s most important painter. Their presence, with its implicit reference to high culture, suggests much about the editors’ frame of reference, a point noted by Lawrence McDonald and Ann Hardy when they separately reviewed the first edition in Illusions in 1993. [1]

Contributors include ten of the country’s most important living filmmakers (John O’Shea, Merata Mita, Vincent Ward, Jane Campion, Barry Barclay, Geoff Murphy, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Gaylene Preston, and Peter Wells) as well as three academics who are also sometimes filmmakers (Leonie Pihama and Annie Goldson from the University of Auckland, and Russell Campbell). The emphasis, throughout the anthology, is on directors and producers, again a point noted critically by McDonald and Hardy.

For McDonald, part of the problem is that the directors chosen represent the high art aspect of Kiwi filmmaking, with only Geoff Murphy representing “the ‘popular'” (p. 60). The other telling criticism from McDonald that the editors seem not to have taken into consideration in their revision is the odd imbalance of values expressed by the timeline. Noting the omission of any reference to three key publications – the now defunct journal Alternative Cinema, the ongoing trade publication Onfilm, and the now erratically published Illusions itself, McDonald writes: “Perhaps we don’t need to know about the existence of regular forums for writing and information about local film production; but it seems we do need to know that a Hong Kong production company used some NZ locations for a film called Aces Go Places IV/Mad Mission IV [Ringo Lam] in 1986″ (p. 62).

Nonetheless, the timeline is a fascinating source of information, including its editorial comments as well as its running threads. For example, it provides statistics across the century on numbers of cinemas operating and admissions as well as a capsule history of television and its impact on filmgoing in this country. (It’s a pity that Varnham’s essay on television was lost, but publication on the history and analysis of television here seems reasonably healthy, e.g., Paul Smith’s Revolution in the Air! [1996].) [2]

It is a little frustrating that, despite a good index, certain basic information, e.g., details (dates; personnel) for the significant About Face series of shorts produced for television broadcast in the late 1980s, just isn’t available, but then Film in Aotearoa New Zealand does not set out to be a reference book. That work remains to be published. It would also have been helpful to have had a glossary of the Maori terms that figure prominently throughout the book.

That absence seems to suggest something about the editors’ target audience: this is an inward-looking volume, even if it holds great interest for outsiders. Throughout, the contributors take a personal tone, often using ‘we’, as though they mean to include their audience in discussion of, for example, the relation of film to national identity in Aotearoa New Zealand. Another characteristic of the contributors’ style is its general informality, which works less well in Miro Bilbrough’s now-dated interview with Jane Campion (which doesn’t do justice to Campion’s personal charm), but more successfully for the expression of sly humor or modest mischievousness in the pieces by John O’Shea, Peter Wells, and Merata Mita.

In other words, Film in Aotearoa New Zealand succeeds very well at what it does, and it can hardly be held responsible for not being all things for all people. What is needed is more; when that comes, Film in Aotearoa New Zealand can take its rightful place among others as a leader in and a major contributor to film culture in its home country, and a book of great interest in its own right for international scholars and fans of films from this country.

NOTES
[1] Ann Hardy, “Valhalla Aotearoa”, Illusions 21-22 (1993), pp. 58-62; Lawrence McDonald,”A book review of Film in Aotearoa New Zealand that ended up as an essay on film in Aotearoa New Zealand”, Illusions 21-22 (1993), pp. 54-58.
[2] Paul Smith Revolution in the Air! (Auckland: Longman, 1996).