2019-09-04 The Hollywood Reporter

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 86 SEPTEMBER 4, 2019

Queenstown to challenge Weta

Group’s status as the only world-

class shop Down Under. Rising

Auckland-based studio Blockhead

VFX, for example, has grown

from doing advertising and credit

sequences on TV series to full-blown

VFX work in feature films, such as

Netflix’s postapocalyptic sci-fi thriller

I Am Mother.

Many of the newer companies see

themselves as the Weta empire’s

collaborators, though, rather than

its competitors.

Why New Zealand Is No Longer Just a Scenic

Studio Backlot Years of big-budget location shoots

give rise to a thriving Kiwi film and TV sector By Patrick Brzeski

A

nnabelle Sheehan, chief executive of

the New Zealand Film Commission,

likes to say that Disney’s Thor:

Ragnarok was “the most expensive New

Zealand film ever made — which Hollywood

and Australia paid for.”

The film, of course, isn’t actually a New

Zealand production at all, and it was shot

in regional production rival Australia. But

thanks to the offbeat humor and casting

choices of its Kiwi director, Taika Waititi, the

Marvel Studios blockbuster had an unmistak-

ably New Zealand accent and sensibility.

In this regard, Ragnarok — and presumably

its forthcoming sequel, which Waititi signed

on to direct in July — represents the inverse

of Hollywood’s usual mode of tentpole film-

making when it comes to New Zealand. The

studios have regularly sought out the country

for its generous production incentives, expe-

rienced crews and stunning locations, but the

resulting blockbusters have bared little trace

of New Zealand’s culture and identity beyond

its otherworldly vistas. Examples of such

productions abound, from 2018’s summer

hits The Meg and Mission: Impossible — Fallout

to Disney’s upcoming live-action Mulan

remake and James Cameron’s wildly ambi-

tious trilogy of Avatar sequels, now shooting

in Wellington.

The steady influx of Hollywood tentpoles

has produced exactly the kind of vibrant

domestic ecosystem that national film incen-

tives are designed to create.

“Twenty years ago, film and television was

mostly a hobbyist industry for a lot of people

here,” says local producer Matthew Metcalfe.

“Now you can hardly walk down the street in

Wellington without falling over someone who

has an Oscar, and we have some of the most

amazing facilities and crews in the world.”

New Zealand’s hard-won production

prowess has arrived at an ideal time, as global

streaming platforms grow increasingly

hungry for fresh perspectives and narrative

worlds that viewers haven’t seen before. This

happy confluence of preparation and oppor-

tunity is giving New Zealand’s filmmakers

the chance to tell their own stories on a global

scale for the first time.

Metcalfe recently wrapped production

on The Dead Lands, a TV series adaptation

and expansion of a 2014 Kiwi film of the

same name. The series, like the film, is an

1 2

V

isual effects from New Zealand

long have been synonymous

with Peter Jackson and Richard

Tay l o r’s pioneering studio Weta

Digital — and not without good rea-

son, considering the six Oscars the

company has won for its work on the

Lord of the Rings franchise, Avatar

and other visionary tentpoles.

In recent years, however, a

whole range of technology

providers, VFX studios and postpro-

duction companies have emerged

in Auckland, Wellington and even

Blockhead VFX teamed with Weta

on Netflix’s feature I Am Mother.

KIWI FX HOUSES MOVE BEYOND MIDDLE EARTH

There’s more to New Zealand’s special effects sector than just Peter Jackson’s Weta Digital