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Shopping, the debut feature from Louis Sutherland and Mark Albiston, dominated the New Zealand Film Awards on Tuesday, winning seven categories and beating out industry veteran Andrew Adamson’s independent feature Mr. Pip, which took out four awards.
The awards, affectionately know as the Moa’s, were handed out at a ceremony in Auckland.
A coming of age tale featuring muscle cars, domestic abuse and a boring retail job, Shopping won the major awards including best film, as well as best direction and best screenplay awards for Sutherland and Albiston. Ginny Loane won best cinematography, while the film also won best poster design.
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The New Zealand awards cap off a year of critical acclaim for Shopping, including its Grand Prix win (of the Generation 14plus International Jury) at Berlin International Film Festival.
The acting awards were evenly divided between M.r Pip and Shopping. British star Hugh Laurie won best actor for his turn in Mr. Pip as an English teacher helping the children of the war torn Pacific island of Bouganville gain a love of reading through the works of Charles Dickens. Xzannjah, won best actress. Shopping’s Julian Dennison and Laura Peterson won best supporting actor and actress respectively.
Mr. Pip also proved successful for Ngila Dickson who won best costume design, and Harry Gregson-Williams and Tim Finn, who won best film score.
Jane Campion’s haunting return to television, Top of the Lake was named best TV feature or drama series, and Utu and Goodbye Pork Pie director, Geoff Murphy, received the Legacy Award.
“The winners and all the nominated films are deserving of a large audience,” the awards event producer Ant Timpson told local media. These awards are a confirmation that we do indeed have a film industry and it’s a very healthy one at that.”
However others used the awards ceremony to focus on calls for the government to increase rebates, which they said would help to save the industry from a major downturn.
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Following the U.K. government’s decision to increase its tax breaks for offshore production to shoot there to 25 percent of a film’s qualifying budget, the New Zealand industry believes that a crisis is looming with no big-budget productions currently filming in the country. The Hobbit films largely finished shooting in October 2012.
Chaz Harris, a Wellington based filmmaker has collected 500 signatures on Change.org, arguing that “in order for New Zealand to have a film industry at all in the long term and to move to a self-sustaining model of filmmakers generating internationally appealing content of their own in the same way Peter Jackson has found success, we need the international work in the short term to exist for experienced crews and acting talent to remain in the country and earn a living.
“As the current situation proves, this will not happen without a globally competitive rebate and also requires smart investment in allowing Kiwi content creators to reach an investment-ready stage with their commercial projects – this is also not currently possible through the mechanisms offered right now,” Harris says.
The full list of the 2013 winners of the New Zealand Film Awards is:
Best Film: Shopping
Best Director: Shopping – Louis Sutherland and Mark Albiston
Best Screenplay: Shopping – Louis Sutherland andMark Albiston
Best Actor: Mr Pip – Hugh Laurie
Best Actress: Mr Pip – Xzannjah
Best Supporting Actor: Shopping – Julian Dennison
Best Supporting Actress: Shopping – Laura Petersen
Best Self-Funded Film: Crackheads – Tim Tsiklauri and Andy Sophocleous
Best Cinematography: Shopping – Ginny Loane
Best Editor: The Weight of Elephants – Molly Marlene Stensgaard
Best Score: Mr Pip – Harry Gregson-Williams and Tim Finn
Best Sound: Mt Zion – Dick Reade
Best Costume Design: Mr Pip – Ngila Dickson
Best Makeup Design: White Lies – Abby Collins, Yolanda Bartram, Vee Gulliver, Andrew Beattie, Main Reactorand Roger Murray
Best Production Design: White Lies – Tracey Collins
Best Poster Design: Shopping – Geoff Francis
Best Self-Funded Short Film: Le Taxidermiste – Nick Mayow and Prisca Bouchet
Best Short Film: Here Be Monsters – Paul Glubb, Nic Gormanand Nadia Maxwell
Best Short Film Actor: Strongman – Tony Green
Best Short Film Actress: Blind Mice – Rachel Nicholls
Best Cinematography in a Short Film: Echoes – Andrew Stroud
Best Short Film Script: Echoes – Campbell Hooperand Joel Kefali
Best Technical Contribution to a Short Film: Blankets – Visual Effects – Frank Rueter, David Dukeand Bodo Keller
Best Documentary: Gardening With Soul – Vicky Pope and Jess Feast
Best Documentary Cinematography: Antarctica: A Year On Ice – Anthony Powell
Best Documentary Director: Beyond The Edge – Leanne Pooley
Best Documentary Editor: He Toki Huna: NZ in Afghanistan – Annie Goldsonand James Brown
Best Television Feature or Drama Series: Top of the Lake – Jane Campion, Emile Sherman, Iain Canning and Philippa Campbell
Lifetime Achievement Award: Geoff Murphy
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