I think realism is amazing and important,
but I like pushing it beyond that.
I want to push it beyond that, because,
I don't know, real life kinda sucks sometimes. (laughs)
(calm music)
Kia ora, I'm Matasila Freshwater, and I'm a writer/director
for animation and live action,
and these are my top five films that inspire me.
You wouldn't have any peanut butter and banana sandwiches,
now, would you?
It was very whimsical and strange,
and I think in New Zealand cinema, we don't see,
we hadn't seen enough of that in our history.
I think we always get told that
our cinema is one of unease,
and it's this dark, brooding thing,
because we're so isolated from the rest of the world,
which is not true, we're like,
literally connected to so many islands around us.
I think whimsy and silliness can really
straddle a wonderful line, where you can touch on
big, serious themes in a
accessible and interesting way that you may not have
seen before.
And actually, like, so many indigenous cultures
straddle that line between spirituality and realism,
and so, that's such a fun, beautiful place
to tell stories from.
(laughs) What's, what you looking at me like that for?
What, man, come on, you just drove down here?
When there's a coming out story, it is,
there's a lot of familiarity that we have
with that sort of narrative,
but because of the specific cultural lens,
it adds a layer that we haven't seen before.
And especially when we have so many stories that
are universal and that we do understand and that,
actually, the specificity of the lens is important
and, yeah, beautiful.
At the start, people used to look at me, you know,
in utter disbelief when I talked about filming,
and I think it was because there are not only no
Maori filmmakers in the country,
but the fact that I was also a woman.
I wanted to pick a Merata Mita film,
but I think what everyone should go watch is
the documentary her son, Hepi Mita, made about her.
I watched that film right before I went to go shoot
my portion of Vai,
and I was so terrified and scared,
and I had grown this grey scale on my face out of stress,
and I was like, it's cancer, I'm gonna die,
and everything's the worst,
but then I watched that doco,
at NZIFF, and it was all I needed
to be like, we can do this and women are amazing,
and indigenous women are amazing,
and, yeah, it's beautiful.
What?
Hey.
(choking)
(flatulence)
The premise is super batshit and insane,
but the heart is so strong and so
sensitive
and really weirdly beautiful,
and I really love that tone and balance,
like it's absolutely silly, but it talks about
stuff that's incredibly important.
You know, we're here to watch a film to take us to
a place, and a new place, and give us a new experience.
Live action absolutely can do it, but doesn't do it
as much.
(upbeat music)
If I saw that as a young kid,
I would have lost my mind.
Like, I lost my mind as an adult,
being like, holy crap, this is what we can do?
We could tell these stories, and they can be
international, and they can be at a huge scale,
and they can be culturally important and fun and empowering.
There's a lot of criticism about,
sort of amalgamating Pacific cultures as one
and sort of taking and choosing bits and pieces of each.
I think it's, how do we have cultural exchange
versus cultural appropriation,
and I think that is a step in the right direction,
it absolutely was not perfect,
but I think it's a good way to talk about how we can
sort of even out equity and power balances.
I think it's an interesting thing to talk about,
especially as we move forward in this industry,
and we want to work with more diverse people,
and then how do we honour their stories
and their collaboration and their process.