Director
The Pleasures of Unbelonging, filmed in Hanmer Spring, a resort town in the Canterbury region of New Zealand’s South Island, unfolds through a series of dreamlike tableaux poised at the fringes of mystery and disquiet. With reference to James Baldwin’s Stranger in a Village, and leaning gently into the heady noir of Vertigo and Twin Peaks, Christopher Ulutupu’s new work stages a drama of encounter with the white gaze.
Director
Drawing on the filmmaker’s real-life experiences growing up in a large Samoan family in the largely Pākehā populated region of Nelson, Hidden Amongst Clouds newly imagines stories of Samoan mythology and questions the moral virtues that they uphold. The work embraces a 1990’s aesthetic, harking back to supernatural fantasy television series and their embedded symbolisms, reflecting Ulutupu’s ongoing interest in themes of belonging and the importance of recontextualising and reimagining narratives of colonial stereotypes.
Assistant Director
"The Green Vessel" tells the journey and the story of an old man on a river. Like a storyteller, he shares with us a story: the tale of a scientist who discovers a contaminated river and tries to understand the sources of this problem. Accompanied by an artist and a young guide, he pursues his research in remotes territories covered by a large forest. As the old narrator continues his tale, he engages himself in a long journey between river and vegetation, a quest that connects him to his own story.
