250,000 Americans To See Film Of N.Z. Scenes

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28907, 29 May 1959, Page 13

250,000 Americans To See Film Of N.Z. Scenes

New Zealand will be shown to about 250,000 Americans all over the United States in a one and a half hour documentary film. Some of the Christchurch scenes were shot yesterday, and the remainder will be completed today. In the city are Mr Nicol Smith, known to many for his book, “Burma Road.” which sold 128.000 copies, and his associate and cameraman, Mr Art Hall, with whom he has been working for the 20 years since they left college.

Scenery, industry and the life of the native population, are the three most important points which Mr Smith aims to record on his colour film which he will use in lecture tours from coast to coast in the United States. “It will be shown in town halls from New York to San Francisco, and later on a 70-station television network,” he said.

It is his claim that an average of 2 per cent, of the audiences that have seen his previous films on other countries have later visited that country as a result of the film. He sees no reason why the same thing should not happen with his film of New Zealand.

Mr Smith seemed weH pleased with New Zealand. He was Impressed with the scenery, the friendliness of the people, the service in hotels, social services and the Government Tourist Bureau. “It has the most intelligent approach in all the world.” he said.

The only thing to go wrong with the tour so far has been the scarcity of big game fish for filming in the Bay of Islands. So far Mr Hall has spent 11 days at. sea there “without even seeing a fin.” Altogether the pair will have spent five months on the film before it is finished. Mr Hall has been in the country since March and will return in December for a month to shoot summer scenes.

Among the scenes already shot are sequences, including Maori dances at Rotorua, butter making at Tirau. toheroha digging at Ninety Mile Beach, the kauri forests and the thermal area. Filming in Wellington included dental (clinics and the Plunket system. ■Mr Smith is especially pleased with 400 feet of film shot of kiwis —“they even winked at the camera.”

i In Christchurch the pair hope to capture the English atmosphere of the city and will Include the Cathedral, gardens, the Sign of the Takahe. bicycles and prams | on buses. They will then move

on for trotting at Ashburton, dog trials at Amuri, the Hermitage. Queenstown, and Dunedin. “The South Island is world famous for its scenery. Everything has been arranged for us and if we don’t have a good film it won’t just be our fault," “ id Mr Smith. All of the tours and expeditions that the pair carry out are undertaken by themselves, although Mr Smith is a fellow of the Royal Geographic Society and the National Geographic Society and carries out lectures under their sponsorship. Among other films they have made are the third expedition to the highest waterfalls in the world, the Angel Falls, and the first time they had been filmed: the first films of the Marineli Glacier in Southern Patagonia; the toy countries of Europe (Monaco, Andorra, San Marino and Licenstein); Scotland, Bavaria, Hawaii and the Argentine. They will spend six months in Australia next year.