The New Zealand International Film Festival

 OUSA is contracted by the New Zealand International Film Festival to handle the festival's publicity for their time in Dunedin.  While Kitty has been doing A TON of work like coordinating the press and liaising with the film festival staff and the local theaters, my job has been that of volunteer coordinator.  We provide two student ushers for every movie screening which is 320 slots!  It's been great having the chance to meet and work with more OUSA volunteers.

The BEST perk of the job is that we all get a free pass to the entire festival, and we're basically required to see as many movies as we can, so we can talk about them.  NO PROBLEM!!  As of this minute (Tuesday, July 26 at 9pm), I have (embarrassingly) seen 12 movies - 10 documentaries and 2 fiction movies!  Crazy, huh? Well I have thoroughly enjoyed all the documentaries and while I still have a few more that I'm planning on seeing, I thought I'd share what I've seen so far and what I thought.

Documentaries

Exit Through the Gift Shop - Loved it!
This documentary is about street art (sometimes known as grafitti) and features Banksy, a very famous street artist in London that no one knows.  It also features Shepard Fairley, who made the iconic Obama poster, and makes you want to find some spray paint and paint a brick wall the minute you leave the theater.

Babies - Loved it (except when the US parents were embarrassing)
This follows four babies - one in Mongolia, Tokyo, Namibia, and San Francisco - from birth to about 18 months old.  It's very cool to see how universal development is and how cool it is to watch babies learn. 

Love, Lust & Lies - eh
This documentary followed three women from age 14 to 47 in Adelaide, Australia.  It's basically an infomercial for staying in school and using birth control.  Two of the three women were train wrecks, and whether or not their kids and grandkids will be is questionable.

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work - Hilarious!!
Having really only known Joan as a red carpet interviewer and fashion critic, this was really interesting.  I learned about her past success (huge), and her undying will to work.  A pleasant surprise with lots of laughing out loud.

His & Hers - adorable
Interviews with Irish women from girls to widows about the men in their life - dads, sons, husbands, boyfriends.  It was lovely.

There Once Was An Island - Great but sad.
This documentary follows a Pacific Island community as they watch their island being devastated by the effects of climate change.  The characters are wonderful and have an amazing sense of the crisis facing them and what it means for their culture. 

Learning from Light: The Vision of I.M. Pei - cool
I.M. Pei, the famous architect who is in his mid-90s, designed the museum at Cornell, so I had to see this one.  It was about the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha which he designed.  The narrator's voice was annoying but seeing Pei's process and the amazing end result was worth it.

Inside Job - AWESOME!!!
This documentary is about the people who f'd up the US economy.  It's wonderful, really informative, and makes you embarrassed to be American when you watch it in a foreign country.  Thanks to This American Life, I already understood what CDOs and credit default swaps were, but this film did a good job of explaining them.  A must see...

Teenage Paparazzo - Made me feel guilty for my People subscription
Just as it sounds, this follows a 13 year old paparazzi photographer and alongside his story, explores the industry, privacy, the magazines that buy the photos, and...the public that read the magazines (which includes yours truly).  Loved it.

Gasland - another sad environmental movie showing how horrible US corporations are
The filmmaker gets an offer to lease his land to a natural gas company and the story goes from there. 

I've got three documentaries left to see...

• Sam Hunt: Purple Balloon & Other Stories which is about a legendary New Zealand poet
• Turtle: The Incredible Journey which about a sea turtle who comes back to where she was born to lay her eggs
• Last Paradise which is about surfing the big waves
• La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet which is about...wait for it...the Paris Opera Ballet

The non-documentaries I've seen so far are I Am Love - an Italian movie, shot in Florence starring Tilda Swinton - and The Illusionist - an animated movie made by the same filmmakers who made The Triplets of Belleville.  While I Am Love was beautiful, the end made me want to punch someone, but up until then I liked it.  The Illusionist was eh.  The non-documentaries I've got left to see are...

• Lourdes which is about the popular religious shrine and it was filmed at Lourdes
• Four Lions which is a comedy about four British Muslims terrorists who are idiots
• Agora which is about the first female mathematical philosopher
• The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell which is a Kiwi comedy-drama about a family in the suburbs

Phew!!! And I'm paying to see The Girl Who Played With Fire, the movie based on the second book in the Millennium trilogy which my bibliophile friends and I can't get enough of - yahoo!