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June 03, 2022
WIFT champion Armstong says time for giving back to Māori film
Adam Gifford
Posted On June 3, 2022
Download AudioThe baton is being passed at this weekend’s Wairoa Maori Film Festival, and its recipient is already looking to pass it on.
Producer Desray Armstrong is this year’s Women In Film And Television Aotearoa Mana Wahine Award winner, and she’ll receive the tohu at Sunday’s WIFT Mana Wahine High Tea from Ella Henry, who won a decade ago.
Other winners have included Briar Grace-Smith, Chelsea Winstanley, Rachel House and Ainsley Gardiner.
Armstrong, whose works includes Wrinkle in Time, What We Do In the Shadows and Mortal Engines, says production is about creating spaces for others to do their work.
She sees a number of promising younger Maori producers coming through, but it’s never enough.
“We as an industry do need to do a lot more work to make sure we are flooding the industry with Maori producers so that there is a succession plan. For me (I feel) sometimes like a teina in this industry, realising the time has gone for receiving and now it’s time for giving back and building capacity,” she says.
The Wairoa Maori Film Festival started today with a food sovereignty day at Nuhaka Marae including the showing of Barry Barclay’s The Neglected Miracle and Milked, Amy Taylor’s feature documentary on New Zealand’s multi-billion-dollar dairy industry.
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