Korimovement from Marina Gabriela Bonofiglio on Vimeo.
Saturday 22 December 2012
Thursday 20 December 2012
Monday 6 August 2012
Gloriavale
Best Documentary – Chicago CineYouth Film Festival
Cody Packer, Shani Annand-Baron and Nathan Joe
Last year I was introduced to Cody Packer, then a Christchurch Broadcasting school student. I’m pret-ty glad about it too - he proved to be an inspirational character in terms of creativity, vision, dedication to his work and that special kind of reasoning narrative you get when working with someone who knows why they’re doing what they're doing and exactly what they want to communicate with it.
This was a really interesting project to be involved with, Cody and the crew spent three days at Gloriavale, a Christian commune in the middle of the South Island of New Zealand. They are a self sustaining community, God-loving, use no contraception, are without debt, believe that we will all be judged when the end is nigh and also believe they are happy. Their community of 320 people live on this property and all work in the business every day, they produce and export all sorts from dairy to wicker baskets …and business is good (they have a plane!).
The team brought me in to look at the footage once they had a rough cut. The challenge by this stage was that they wanted to get across the eerie, not quite right feel of the place but had also signed a contract with Gloriavale ensuring they would keep the documentary neutral. I wrote a few sparse pieces that were leaning towards a surreal vibe, and we decided on the simple theme that is now throughout. The logic was that if the men running the place were to watch it, they’d hear the Angelic music and assume that they were being portrayed as children of God etc. Though to us watching it, it felt quite disturbing. I think it compounds the feeling as the film moves along too.
The end result is here:
Cody and team did a great job, it’s a beautiful doco with a truly underlying eeriness that seems like an instinctive feeling when you watch it. They won best documentary at the Chicago CineYouth Film Festival 2012, it will now screen at the Chicago International Film Festival in October.
I was also lucky to have Cody direct a music video for an Mmdelai track – though it’s pretty cringey watching myself etc etc, the production is great and I love the scenes in the crate wrap box.
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