The Wireless

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: HAMISH BENNETT

Tihei Harawera has a way with words. Weaving meanings and style into stream of consciousness lyrics, he stands at the Otara markets once a week with a sign and a stereo, offering to rap about a topic of the passers-bys choosing.

Director Hamish Bennett (Te Arawa, Ngāpuhi, Kāi Tahu), who grew up in the same town as Harawera, had been intrigued by his unique talent ever since seeing a video of his performance.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: LOUIS OLDEN AND FRANCES HASZARD

In their new Loading Docs film, Louis Olsen and Frances Haszard are uncovering the Waihorutiu Stream or the Queen Street River, names of the river remnant that flows unseen under Queen Street in Auckland.

The river, which was covered up in the 1800s due to urban expansion, has attracted ongoing interest from archaeologists to artists, and now filmmakers, who hope to bring attention to the loss of waterways.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: J.Ollie Lucks

Larger than life former pro-wrestler Wilbur Force (William McDougall) commands the screen in a new Loading Docs film, battling his ‘worst self’ alongside director and friend J.Ollie Lucks.

Lucks first became aware of McDougall when he was a student taking theatre 101 classes in Dunedin.

“I was the German sitting in the front row taking notes, paying attention, being there on time, and he would usually get in late, sit in the back and yell inappropriate remarks and annoy me,” says Lucks.  Read more

Yes, pro wrestling does exist in New Zealand – and one of its stars is poised to make a comeback.

Not many people can say they’ve made a career out of an obsession, but this Otago lad isn’t your average person.

Wilbur McDougall, 28, is an actor, comedian and wrestler who came to prominence in the New Zealand wrestling scene in the late ‘00s with his alter-ego “Wilbur Force”.

Before Wilbur became the “Force”, the self-confessed beach boy grew up in the coastal-suburb of Broad Bay, Dunedin. “I was obsessed with wrestling from the age of 9, it’s a bit embarrassing but I have about 50 toys that I’ve kept.”  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: HENRY OLIVER AND AMBER EASBY

First-time film directors Henry Oliver and Amber Easby explore award-winning winemaker Hiro Kusuda’s philosophical and unique process with their new Loading Docs film.

Arriving in Martinborough with visions of filming idyllic sunny landscapes, the filmmakers were instead hit by an unexpected cyclone.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: NIKKI CASTLE

Screening as part of the New Zealand International Film Festival, Madness Made Me meets prominent mental health care activist Mary O’Hagan as she contrasts her personal diary entries against rigid medical records of her time spent in mental health care facilities.

Running her finger under passages which dismiss her feelings, and compartmentalise her behaviours, O’Hagan humanises behaviours, and shares a moment when she struggled with her mental illness.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: ROWENA BAINES

Dancing in the Dark follows dancer Peter Vosper as he prepares to make his way to No Lights No Lycra on a Monday night.

Vosper slips into his self-designed glowing neon suit, and illuminating the dark streets with playful wiggles, he prances gleefully forward, towards a night of dancing.

The film is one of the five short documentaries that have been selected to premiere at the New Zealand International Film Festival.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: WENDELL COOKE AND JEREMY MACEY

Filmmakers Wendell Cooke and Jeremy Macey get to know Gina, a woman with a rare genetic disorder, as they explore the issue of voluntary euthanasia for their Loading Docs film.

Gina, who has an unnamed connective tissue disorder, is in her mid-40s. Her condition affects her eyes, ears, and larynx, making it hard for her to see, hear, or talk.

“You can’t talk a lot to Gina because it damages her tissues, you can only whisper a little bit, so most [communication] is through letter charting,” says Jeremy Macey.  Read more

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: ROBIN GEE AND KARL SHERIDAN

Please Open invites the viewer to step over the worn threshold and into a visual exploration of Auckland’s Crystal Palace cinema. Directors Robin Gee and Karl Sheridan celebrate the cinema’s life and character for their Loading Docs short film.

The title “Please Open” is taken from the words written in flakey gold paint on the front door of the Crystal Palace, and the film plays with the concept of inviting the viewer to take a closer look into the cinema, rather than just a hurried glance at an old exterior.

“It’s a sneak peak or insight into what the theatre was, and is, and could be. It explores a little bit of the architecture and the people that surround it,” says Sheridan.

Capturing the vivid stories and memories that make up the history of the Crystal Palace was essential to telling the story.

“People would come and tell great stories about how couples met there and got married, lots of people did. We had people that played there, people that used to go dancing, people who had their first kiss in the back row,” says Gee.

He also set up an impromptu  “listening booth” to learn more about the theatre. “Lots of people came in wanting to tell stories.”

Gee spent six weeks in the cinema, getting to know its history, in preparation for making the documentary.

“For us, we really wanted to have the connection with community, that was really important for us. It’s really about the people and the magical aspects of it,” he says.

“Being in an empty theatre is quite a unique experience, it’s not spooky at all. It’s got ghosts, but ghosts of good times and memories.”

During the filmmaking process Sheridan dubbed Gee the “unofficial historian of the theatre”, a title that the filmmaker is at home with.

Sheridan, who runs production company Monster Valley, used to have a studio near Crystal Palace and was drawn to capturing its unique charms on film.

“Robin and I talked about it one day and thought that would be an awesome thing to share with everyone. It’s a bit of a gem that’s sitting there … so we wanted people to see it and experience it, maybe start some more interest in it.”

For Sheridan, the pleasure has come in igniting interest in the cinema.

“Everyone’s been so supportive of the project, it’s been really great. We held a fundraising screening, and over 500 people showed up,” says Sheridan.

“It was great to be able to introduce it to people for the first time, or reintroduce it to people who used to go there, and thought that it was all locked up.”

As well as their Loading Docs film, Sheridan and Gee are also working to collate the information they’ve collected about the Crystal Palace into an online resource.

“I like the idea of questioning what’s next for the theatre, rather than just saying what it was,” says Sheridan.

“Getting the theatre out there, getting people to submit their own stories, hopefully that’ll spark interest around other places around the country.”

Story by Elizabeth Beattie.

via The Wireless

Loading Docs is a launching pad for New Zealand short documentaries which has just released 10 new films. We’ll be featuring each of the films and profiling the directors behind them.

DIRECTOR PROFILE: JUSTIN HAWKES AND IAN HART

Have you ever wondered what your pets think of you? Or which animals are the funniest?

Faye Rogers can answer those questions for you.

The animal communicator from Christchurch is the subject of Conversations With Pets, a three-minute Loading Docs documentary directed by Justin Hawkes and Ian Hart.

Soon after the filmmakers arrived in Christchurch, Roger’s skills were put to the test when she was contacted via Skype by an American client concerned about her lost kitten.

“She started communicating with this lost kitten in America, she was really nervous, we could hear through the microphone her heart beat start racing, like she was so involved in the moment – [historically] she didn’t want to be filmed before [now] so it was really quite exciting,” Hawkes says.

“She starts channelling the kitten, she put herself inside the kitten and was telling the client ‘I see this, and I see that,’ it was a great bit of drama that we weren’t expecting. I loved that moment because I felt like it wasn’t something I’ve seen before.”

Hawkes, who works as a story producer for Dancing with the Stars, and comes from a travel documentary background, has always enjoyed seeking out the unusual.

“I’d always wanted to do something with a pet communicator, so we started looking for someone in New Zealand and she was one of the leading lights – in the pet communicating world she’s quite big.”

“On face she just seems like this nice, suburban Christchurch woman, [and] then she’s got this amazing ability.”

In the course of their filming, Rogers talked to a variety of different animals from dogs to spiders.

“There was an overweight cat that was really embarrassed about being fat, talking about its diet, because it was there during the Christchurch earthquake,  and to comfort itself, it had eaten a lot of food, to get away from the shock.

“We met a spider that was just annoyed she’d taken down its cobwebs… [and] apparently guinea pigs are really funny … It was good to know, from her perspective, that animals have characters,” Hawkes says.

Hawkes enjoys watching and creating documentaries, and had been interested in making a Loading Docs production for a while. “It’s great, even though it’s quite small, somewhere where people can have a go at making documentaries in New Zealand.”

Filming for two days meant there was footage that didn’t make the final cut, but for Hawkes, who produces short bites for TV, three minutes offered him a lot of creative freedom.

“I work on Dancing with the Stars, where every week I make a 1:15 story on celebrities and their story for that week, so three minutes is like a lifetime for me. But it is challenging, because we filmed for two days and wanted to do so many cool things,” he says.

With platforms such as Loading Docs available, and filmmaking equipment becoming more readily available and user-friendly, Hawkes urges those interesting in filmmaking to start creating stories.

“Everyone has a story it’s just finding that story you want to tell and going out and filming it, even if it is three minutes. I had such a good experience doing this.”

With the film completed, the next step for Hawkes and Hart is to send their documentary over to the States.

“There’s a film festival in America called PetDance, and our little dream is to see if we can get it into that. Everyone can get into Sundance, but [not] PetDance!”

Story by Elizabeth Beattie.

via The Wireless