Interesting success for Survey team

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32588, 23 April 1971, Page 4

Interesting success for Survey team

It was refreshing, especially when we are constantly criticised for a lack of national consciousness, to see a programme in which New Zealanders were enthusiastic about their own country. The N.Z.B.C.’s Survey documentary about people’s attitudes and aspirations was generally successful in its attempt to catch and highlight some of the things about which some of us feel strongly.

At the outset the programme, “The Happy Country" was termed a random selection, but of course it was hardly that. Faces, voices and views already familiar flashed on and off the screen, and it was obvious that some people had been asked for their views because they were forthright, unorthodox, original or critical. I found no fault with this —in fact it is doubtful whether an interesting programme could have been iproduced without seeking out 'people who had something to say.

And the point was made somewhere in the programme, by the articulate young lady tagged as a housewife and journalist, that this country's national disease is apathy. She added pertinently that “she’ll be right” has become such an art we are proud of it.

It was interesting to see what people valued most about New Zealand the wide, open spaces, friendly faces, home life, freedom, equal opportunity and Professor Geering, “even if he is wrong.”

And succinct as Usual was Dr John Moffat with his pleasure at being able to get in 15 minutes from his library to a secluded area of riverbed “where I can bathe in the nude.” Every man to his taste, I say, but of course he does have an important point—and I hope the spot in the Waimakariri where he swims remains for ever unpolluted. There were lags in the programme, especially where subjects, no doubt asked for their views and primed beforehand, gave studied replies, almost as if they were reading them. The Maori comment did not come over clearly, although the innuendo of pakeha domination and lack of awareness of Maori needs was clear enough. The programme certainly held my attention for its allotted span—which is, after all, the prime requisite of any documentary. But more than that, i found myself making comments of agreement, and at times strong disagreement. For example, I did not go along with the young journalist’s comment about young people getting to the top quickly. How many editors of newspapers in New Zealand today are in their twenties or thirties? But if other viewers

reacted likewise on various points made, then the Survey team can rate the show a definite success, for interest and stimulation of thought and reaction is surely half ihe battle.

And if there is one aspect of New Zealanders’ attitudes that did not come out in the programme it is the singular unwillingness to take a good look at the other chap’s point of view, and if necessary, modify. our own. I liked also the comment about legitimate criticism of the way we run our affairs being buffered by a fear of hurting neighbours or friends, such is the smallness and folksey nature of our society. Maybe we should either grow up a little, or become larger in population. And another comment that carries scope for much discussion was that by Dr Moffat about pollution—when it gets bad enough we clean it up. What worries me is whether we should even wait as long as that. It was revealing how almost all comments in the programme revealed our insularity—even to the student who felt she must leave the country when she graduates. And it was also interesting how an impatience with the general down-grading of talent by New Zealand mediocrity was expressed. There was also an uncertainty as to what sort of New Zealand we will have in 10 years time, and a kind of helplessness in having anything to do with influencing events that will control this.

One criticism 1 would have is that views reflected all seemed to be so middle-class, if that term is relevant to New Zealand. I just don’t believe that Mr Bill Martin of the Seamen’s Union represented all that workers believe and hope for about their country. And neither were young people’s views well expressed by those who were selected in this category. However, these are minor carpings, and the programme was a welcome look at some of the issues which more profoundly affects us as people than we often care to admit. —PANDORA’S GUEST.

Bobbie. Gentry

In 1967 people became aware of an exciting new voice on the pop scene. “Ode to Billy Joe,” the sad and myterious story of a poor white girl in the southern states whose boyfriend, Billy Joe McAllister, commits suicide on July 3 by jumping off the Tallahatchee Bridge, caught everyone’s imagination.

The singer was Bobbie Gentry, and by the time she arrived in Britain in 1968 she was greeted as a top star.

A majority of Bobbie’s songs revolve round the the country folk and everyday events of the type she knew on her grandfather’s farm. The inhabitants of that county in Mississippi have every reason to be grateful to her, for the fatal day of June 3 has been declared a public holiday there. A series of five new “Bobbie Gentry” shows has been produced by Stanley Dorfman for 8.8. C., and the musical director is John Cameron. "Bobbie Gentry” starts screening, from CHTV3 on Wednesday April 28.