So, I just watched Perfect Creature, and, despite being a glorious symphony of steampunk sensibilities (they had little blood-taps in their arms. Little copper taps. It was so lovely... <3), it was still, overall, a fairly shitty movie. Much like the only other kiwi sci-fi flick I ever watched, don't ask me what it was called 'cause I can't fucking remember, that's how much impact it had on me. All I remember is that it was one of those sci-fi flick's where people travel round in silver bubble-cycles. You know the kind, and everybody is dressed as a techno-goth or 80's aesthetic futurist business-wear... At least they were at one point ... I think they may have travelled in time through a wavy, shiny wall and ended up in victorian Auckland (now there's a wierd thought) for a wee while. ANYWAY. My point was, that was a shitty movie too. And New Zealander's just can't do sci-fi. They just fail at it. Shockingly. Basically, the only thing we can to well is grey-scale low-budget festival films shot in some anti-idyll vision of NZ that's about 20 years out of date as far as most of the population's concerned... Oh and of course self-deprecating humor, a la Sione's Wedding & Black Sheep. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love to see films that don't feel like they're apologising the entire way through for having been made in NZ, but what sticks in my throat is that whenever anybody does try to make a hollywood-style slick, modern film that is unapologetically set in our fair land, they fail miserably.
And I have a theory as to why this is. It's because all of the good are too well-set in cutural cringe to even dare something a little bit hollywood. Because, of course, the good writers see that hollywood slick is transient, and good films are gritty and realistic, and shot through an equally gritty lens. But quite honestly, I think that some of the good writers should pull themselves out of their own arses and make good films for a change. Touching vignettes are all very well and good, but they have been done to fucking death, move on. Please.
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