New Zealand-Born Moving Picture Director

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21819, 23 November 1940, Page 10

New Zealand-Born Moving Picture Director

A man of many parts and a master of them all—motion picture director, cameraman, musician, explorer, journalist, student of science and vital personality—Noel Monkman is the director of the Australian production “The Power and the Glory.” Monkman first came into contact with pictures in New Zealand, his birthplace, where he was a Press Photographer. Deserting this as a profession, he turned to music, crossed the Tasman and joined the orchestra of North Sydney’s Orpheum Theatre. Pleasantly ensconced here, he turned to photography again, as a hobby. He had long toyed with the idea of building a micro-photographic apparatus which could film in slow motion and greatly magnify the minutest bacteria and the most infinitesimal sea life. Experiments soon commenced to bear fruit and the theatre manager became keenly interested in each new fascinating development. More light was required so all equipment was transferred to the projection booth. Here, the powerful arc lamps could be employed. The first micro films made in Australia were projected form that same booth at the Orpheum Theatre in 1921. He temporarily shelved the project and returned to New Zealand. In 1929 Australia saw him again. This time he was toying with another ingenious trick photographic plan. Not satisfied with filming bacteria on land, he proposed to study minute sea life in their natural surroundings, under water. The late motion picture pioneer F. T. Thring formed a company, Australian Educational Films, in which Noel Monkman was co-partner and producer. Now armed with confidence, capital and cameras, he set his course northward for the Barrier Reef. In all, he made a series of five fascinating shorts dealing with microscopic plant life, strangely beautiful coral formations, and the weird bird life of neighbouring islands. In 1932 the imperious wanderlust gripped him again, and organising an expedition he travelled

thousands of miles, filming as he went from Western N.S.W. to coastal Queensland, inland to the Gulf country and through the alligator swamps to the Northern Territory. The party lived on the land, spearing fish, shooting game, gathering fruit and collecting water where they found it. On his return to civilisation he completed his shorts, releasing them as “Monkman Marvelogues.”