C.K. Stead memoir You Have A Lot To Lose - on meeting movie-maker Roger Donaldson

Author C.K. Stead, whose memoir You Have A Lot To Lose, is published by Auckland University Press. Photo / Supplied

C.K. Stead recalls his first encounter with film-maker Roger Donaldson, in an extract from his memoir.

I was to be away on leave for the first two terms of 1977, and my mind was full of that prospect when a handsome young Australian with a moustache and a head of curly hair knocked at my office door and introduced himself as Roger Donaldson. He had been living in New Zealand since 1965, an escapee from conscription into the Australian Army deployed in Vietnam, and now wanting to make a movie of Smith's Dream. He had engaged the actor Sam Neill, who was on the brink of giving up acting; and the cinematographer Michael Seresin. These three would go on to make such distinguished careers for themselves it's not too much to say each in his own way became famous – rich and famous; not because of Sleeping Dogs, as Smith's Dream became in the movie version, but it gave them each their start. Ian Mune was to act in it and to be one of two scriptwriters.

I was pleased by Roger's enthusiasm but I did not really take it seriously – in fact, my attention was so focused on other things that I have only vague memory of formal dealings on the subject; but there was a contract which committed the film-makers to paying $5000 for the option, which I would split 75/25 with the publisher, Longman Paul. I was also promised 2.5 per cent of all receipts for overseas releases and any video or electronic returns. My $3750 share of the initial option was all I ever received but that seemed a lot at the time and I was astonished, then and thereafter, at the energy, practicality, confidence and general good sense Roger brought to the business of movie-making. Sleeping Dogs, looked back at now, seems a creaky old product, not well scripted, unsubtle and overblown; but it was a first – the first New Zealand commercial movie filmed in 35mm, and the first to have international release.

I signed up, agreeing that Roger go ahead, not really expecting to hear more and flew off at the end of 1976 with the family to London, where from time to time letters from friends, and newspaper clippings, kept me aware that the project was, in fact, happening at great speed. We would be back towards the end of 1977, just in time to see its pre-release showing in a small theatrette in the Civic cinema.

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We had arrived back in August 1977 just in time to see the first private screening of Sleeping Dogs, due soon for public release. I was struck early on in the movie by how well it worked by contrasts, juxtaposing the calmness and beauty of the Coromandel scenes and the violence in the streets of Auckland. But as the movie went on what I am now able to think of as Roger Donaldson's (and also Ian Mune's, who was one of two scriptwriters) characteristic faults began to show: overstatement, melodrama, and a casualness about plausibility. I remain an admirer of Donaldson for his practicality, his charm and refusal to be stopped by obstacles (who else could have persuaded the New Zealand Air Force to provide fighter planes and aerial attacks at no cost?); and when asked at the time I spoke only positively and admiringly of what he had done. But I did regret especially the script, and the loss of any political subtlety or depth. Ian's idea of theatrical riches did not seem to relate to language so much as to volume. It was as if, when finding himself at a loss for where to go next, he had a character get very angry and shout, "You bastard!"
Ian (who played Smith's friend Bullen) had also written a very long death for himself, which involved an exceedingly protracted downhill roll; and in the first few days of public screenings it was said Roger was still busy cutting some of that scene's embarrassing excess.

But the movie had a local success which would not be possible now. A New Zealand feature film was a rare event and this one was showing all over New Zealand to full houses. Sam Neill's movie career was launched; so was Roger's, who would follow with Smash Palace starring Bruno Lawrence, then a new version of Mutiny on the Bounty for the Dino De Laurentiis company – and Hollywood. The paperback of Smith's Dream was released yet again with, on the cover, a still from the movie of Sam and Ian up to their waists in a cold stream; and it seemed for some years almost every secondary school child in the country studied the novel - and usually the film with it. I accepted invitations to visit secondary schools and teachers' colleges when I could – visits that often involved scary flights in very small commercial planes.

Kay and Karl Stead, Maunsell Road, 1960. Photo /Marti Friedlander

News came that Roger and Ian would be taking Sleeping Dogs to the Cannes Film Festival and its local success continued. I received thundering messages of congratulation from far-left groups (including one from the Marxist-Leninist Workers Party) who saw Smith's Dream as a forecast of where capitalism was taking us – into fascism and the American Way – a view which was in turn promoted by the behaviour of Rob Muldoon, elected Prime Minister in 1975. Muldoon's use of the language could be impressive but the eloquence and fluency which came naturally to him was mostly overlooked, because the strongest impression his speeches made was their uncompromising abrasiveness and aggression. He was politically unscrupulous and (for example) used knowledge that came to him as head of the SIS to make it known in Parliament that the police had been questioning the senior Labour MP Colin Moyle about "homosexual activities" – this in order to deflect attention from the questions Moyle had been asking about possibly dishonest dealings by Muldoon's accountancy firm.

Many people were alarmed and there were calls to talkback radio referring to Smith's Dream and saying the character of Volkner, who takes control of the country and calls in the Americans to help against freedom fighters in the hills, was based on, or meant to be, Muldoon.

Towards the end of 1978 there was a visit to New Zealand by the West German President Walter Scheel, and the University of Auckland decided to confer an honorary doctorate on him. The event was in daylight and out of doors, in the grounds and gardens of Old Government House. When the speeches were over our chancellor, Henry Cooper, introduced Kay and me to Muldoon, who said at once, looking at me, "Oh so you're that one, are you?" He was thinking of Smith's Dream – and more particularly of the movie. "They were saying it was about me," he said. He explained that he never went to the movies these days – his presence drew too much attention – but he'd felt he had to arrange for a private showing of Sleeping Dogs so he could check on why this was being said about it, and about him.

I explained that he was not so well known, and was in fact in the Opposition, when I was writing the book. This seemed to imply, "No, of course it was not about you." I was being polite to the visitor but Kay thought too polite.

"Yes," she said. "You've just grown in to the role."

Muldoon hoisted his cheek scar and uttered his famous mirthless laugh. "Uhk, uhk, uhk ..."

Another person who did not normally go to the cinema was Frank Sargeson. Movies never figured in his conversation and my guess is that if he had been to one since the old silent-screen days, it might have been during World War II. But he came with me to see Sleeping Dogs. He looked stunned afterwards and had nothing to say. I suspect if I'd asked what he thought, he would have said, "Buggered if I know, Karl." It's the occasion that stays with me, like a little piece of our literary history.

But when I look at the volume of his letters I see that Frank had been very early to make the connection of the novel with Muldoon and with Vietnam. To Phil Wilson he had written:

You Have A Lot To Lose, a memoir, by C.K. Stead, Auckland University Press, $50.

"But Karl, yes, his Smith's Dream is out at last. Very readable. He's kinda followed Graham Greene and kinda written a B.O.P. [Boy's Own Paper] adventure story, making the hero from the Left instead of the Right, tying it all up with the Cong etc."

Intelligent stuff, it could be popular and DO GOOD. I hope so, though perhaps better if Muldoon read it by accident and found something had got under his skin. You'll get pleasure from this book.

The "kinda ... kinda" and the "B.O.P." suggestion sound like notes at least of uncertainty/reservation. I think the novel was for Frank, as for many people, one that was difficult to "place", and especially so coming from me. To Brasch he wrote a few weeks later, after the same B.O.P. comment, "I thought it all most agreeable and refreshing reading. If K's not careful he'll become known as our Graham Greene."

YOU HAVE A LOT TO LOSE: A MEMOIR, 1956–1986 by C.K. Stead, Auckland University Press, $50.