The Year in Review:
The Best of Film in 2015, Part 1
December 15, 2015
The year in cinema releases, festival highlights, and moments from films that history might otherwise forget.
Archives by Contributor » Doug Dillaman
The Year in Review:
Houses and Homes:
Briar March on A Place to Call Home
December 14, 2015
Filmmaker Briar March talks about the creative and collaborative process behind her three-year project to document opposing housing projects in Glen Innes and Northland.
Crushing Riffs, Climbing Mountains: TRIUMPHS
November 2, 2015
Mat Anderson and John Bollen of two-piece Dunedin heavy band TRIUMPHS on making music, channeling Sir Edmund Hillary, and what they listen to on the road.
Recapping the
Big Screen Symposium 2015
October 15, 2015
Collaboration and process were front and centre at the fourth annual Big Screen Symposium for New Zealand filmmakers.
What to Watch at NZIFF 2015, Part 1
July 13, 2015
The dramatic and documentary revelations you may have overlooked at this year’s New Zealand International Film Festival.
A Sydney Film Festival sampler
June 8, 2015
At the Sydney Film Festival 2015: Hong Sang-soo’s latest, Hill of Freedom, plus documentaries Breaking a Monster, The Russian Woodpecker, and Ulrich Seidl’s In the Basement.
Documentary Edge Festival 2015: (T)ERROR, Heaven Adores You, Sweet Micky for President
May 22, 2015
At the Documentary Edge Festival: counter-terrorism through the eyes of an informant; the life and times of Elliot Smith; and an unlikely Haitian presidential campaign.
“Sometimes we are greater than ourselves when we write”
May 20, 2015
At this year’s Auckland Writers Festival, the glass was not just half-full, but brimming, overflowing.
The Rituals of Reporoa:
The Ground We Won
May 1, 2015
A conversation about tackling rugby, male identity, and rural stoicism with filmmakers Christopher Pryor and Miriam Smith.
2001: A Signifying Odyssey
April 13, 2015
Reading Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, one mystery at a time.
Post-Festival Report 2014:
The Point of It
August 21, 2014
Closing notes on evil, activism, resistance, and the films that deserve a second chance at the New Zealand International Film Festival.
Tone Tests: Borgman, Enemy, Unnatural History, and Housebound
August 12, 2014
Between the films of Alex van Warmerdam, Denis Villeneuve, Alex Backhouse, and Gerard Johnstone at this year’s New Zealand International Film Festival, tone is everything.
Contemplating National Gallery and PRISMISM
August 1, 2014
The parallel spaces of Frederick Wiseman’s National Gallery documentary and Emil McAvoy’s first exhibition of paintings.
Making REALITi
July 31, 2014
On the eve of its world premiere, Jonathan King takes us behind the scenes of his new science-fiction venture.
Contemplating the Engine Room: Snowpiercer
June 30, 2014
With Bong Joon-ho’s latest, you never know what’s behind the next door until you break through.
Notes from the
Wellington Jazz Festival
June 19, 2014
Joshua Redman, Chick Corea with Gary Burton, Pablo Ziegler, and Dawn of Midi were among the the standout international acts at this year’s Wellington Jazz Festival.
Global Letters:
Auckland Writers Festival 2014
May 20, 2014
Sessions on North Korea, fascist Italy, and the Arab world compelled at this year’s Auckland Writers Festival.
A French Film Festival Dispatch: Our Heroes Died Tonight, Suzanne
April 4, 2014
At the Alliance Française French Film Festival, David Perrault’s heady black-and-white debut, plus Katell Quillévéré’s bracing sophomore feature.
A French Film Festival Dispatch: Atilla Marcel, The Extraordinary Voyage (with A Trip to the Moon)
March 25, 2014
At the Alliance Française French Film Festival, a new film by Sylvain Chomet, plus the journey of George Méliès’s iconic 1902 fantasy, from inception to restoration.
Yo La Tengo; Frente Cumbiero
March 16, 2014
A review of Yo La Tengo and Frente Cumbiero in concert at the New Zealand Festival.