Peter Jackson's film Braindead, starring Tim Balme.
Peter Jackson's film Braindead, starring Tim Balme.
Opinion
Looking for costume inspiration for Halloween tonight? NZ On Screen Content Director Irene Gardiner selects some Kiwi film and television classics featuring ghosts, witches, vampires, zombies, monsters and mutants.
As well as being Halloween, today is also Sir Peter Jackson's birthday, so who better to kick off this selection than the man whose early film career was as the master of low-budget but brilliant splatter films.
Jackson's breakthrough feature film Bad Taste was actually about aliens, which may not strictly fit the Halloween theme. But the aliens have a definite monster/mutant look about them that could surely inspire a trick or treating outfit. Alien Investigation and Detection Service operatives run amok with guns, food, vomit, rockets and misguided enthusiasm to rid the earth of alien Lord Crumb and his fast-food gang, who want to turn earthlings into hamburgers. Jackson takes two acting roles in this "splatstick" masterpiece, which went on to rack up sales, acclaim and cult status.
You can also view excerpts from Good Taste Made Bad Taste, a 1988 documentary on the making of Bad Taste. Compiled following the film's 1988 Cannes market screening, it's framed around an extensive interview with a then 25-year-old Jackson at his parents' Pukerua Bay home. These excerpts offer a fascinating insight into his ingenuity: from building a DIY steadicam, to the making of the infamous sheep-obliterating rocket launcher scene, to Jackson musing on the impetus that being an only child provided him.
View Good Taste Made Bad Taste here:
Jackson followed up Bad Taste with the mad puppetry of Meet the Feebles, and then - for feature film number three - it was zombies all the way, with Braindead in 1992. After his Mother gets infected by a bite from a deadly Sumatran Rat Monkey, Lionel (an award-winning Tim Balme) has to contend with a plague of the living dead while attempting to woo the love of his life, Paquita.
Here's the Braindead trailer:
Continuing with the zombie theme, but moving to 2011 now, and the acclaimed short film Rotting Hill. This gleefully violent "zombie romcom" is from Auckland's Media Design School, where 3D CGI students collaborate with their tutor, director James Cunningham, and industry veterans. Two lovers - played by Anna Hutchinson and Jason Smith - find that "true love never dies" in a post-human future. Warning - the opening sequence is particularly gross.
Check out Rotting Hill here:
For some more traditional ghostly fare, 1980s television series A Haunting We Will Go features a haunted house, spooks, and - of course - NZ TV's favourite vampire Count Homogenized thrown in for good measure. That white afro wig could make a definite retro statement for your Halloween party. In this early episode of A Haunting We Will Go, the Count turns up at Major Toom's haunted house on his unending search for bovine liquid sustenance, and befriends Toom over some wine.
Watch A Haunting We Will Go - Cellar Ghost here:
A little later in the 1980s, Wellington producers The Gibson Group made tele-feature The Haunting of Barney Palmer, about a young boy who is haunted by his great uncle. The fantasy movie for children was a U.S. co-production, which resulted in Ned Beatty (Deliverance, Network) being in the cast. The film was written by Margaret Mahy, based on her book The Haunting.
Also from the Gibson Group and directed by Yvonne Mackay is The Monster's Christmas - another TV film for kids which throws viewers into a world of friendly creatures, talking hot pools and witches with gym equipment in their cave lairs. A plucky young girl encounters a one-eyed monster with smoke billowing from his head. The monsters need her help to steal their voices back from an evil witch. The stylings of the live action creatures were influenced by the volcanic North Island locations, and designed by Janet Williamson and cartoonist Burton Silver. It might be a little bit the wrong seasonal festivity (Christmas rather than Halloween) but it's one of the few NZ screen offerings to feature witches.
You can see The Monster's Christmas here:
You can see a more comprehensive selection of NZ screen ghosts, witches, vampires, zombies, monsters and mutants here.
