Renae Maihi | |
|---|---|
| Born | Auckland, New Zealand |
| Occupation(s) | Director, writer, producer |
| Years active | 2009–present |
| Children | 1 |
| Website | https://www.renaemaihi.com/ |
Renae Maihi is a New Zealand film director and screenwriter. [1] [2] She is best known for her work on the films Waru and We Are Still Here , both of which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2017 and 2022 respectively. [3] [4]
Maihi was born in Auckland, New Zealand. She is Māori of the Ngāpuhi and Te Arawa tribes as well as NZ European. [2]
In 2009, Maihi made her writing debut with Nga Manurere, starring Keisha Castle-Hughes. [5] In 2010, she made her screenwriting debut with short film, Redemption, which premiered at the 60th Berlin International Film Festival and Sundance Film Festival. [6] Her play, Patua, about child abuse won Adam NZ Play Award for best play by a Maori Playwright 2013, and her directorial theatre debut garnered critical acclaim in New Zealand. [7] She subsequently wrote and directed the short film, Butterfly (Purerehua), funded by the New Zealand Film Commission. [8] Butterfly premiered as part of the ImagineNATIVE Film Festival Māori spotlight in 2013 and screened in a programme alongside Taika Waititi’s Two Cars One Night . [9] In 2015, her short film, Mannahatta, premiered at ImagineNATIVE Film Festival in Toronto. [10] Mannahatta was later selected as a finalist for "Best Short Film" at the New Zealand International Film Festival. [11] During 2015, she worked on series 2 of My Kitchen Rules NZ as the Talent coordinator. [12]
Maihi's feature film, Waru, which she co-wrote and co-directed in collaboration with 8 other Māori women filmmakers was made up of a series of vignettes which addressed the widespread issue of child abuse in New Zealand. [13] [14] [15] The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, [16] won the audience award at Seattle International Film Festival and the grand jury award for an outstanding international narrative feature at the 34th Asia-Pacific Film Festival in Los Angeles. [17] [18] It was also screened at the Wairoa Māori Film Festival, where it won the Indigenous Rights award. [19]
In 2018, she was awarded the NZFC Maori Screen Excellence Award and Whakapapa Film Festival of Italy Award. [20] Her films were screened as part of a retrospective on Māori filmmakers at Auckland's first Māori Film Week and the New Zealand International Film Festival. [21] [19]
She directed one of the segments of the anthology film We Are Still Here , which premiered as the opening film of the 2022 Sydney Film Festival and had its North American premiere in the Contemporary World Cinema program at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival. [22] We Are Still Here won Best Dramatic Feature Film at the 2022 imagineNATIVE Film Festival in Toronto. [23]
For Waitangi Day in 2018, Bob Jones wrote an opinion piece calling for an annual "Māori Gratitude Day", where among other things he suggested that Māori serve breakfast in bed to Europeans as Māori owe their existence to British migrants. The opinion piece was published in the National Business Review on 2 February and caused so much outrage that it was soon deleted from their website. [24] In response, Maihi started a petition calling for Bob to be stripped of his knighthood (received as a Knight Bachelor in the 1989 Queen's Birthday Honours) and on 27 March 2018, the petition (with then 68,000 signatures) was presented to parliament and received by MPs Kiri Allan and Willie Jackson. [25] In a seven to four majority decision in April 2018, the New Zealand Media Council did not uphold a complaint about the opinion piece, but noted that the National Business Review's decision to no longer publish columns by Jones was an "appropriate response to the justified public outrage". [26] [27]
In June 2018, Jones filed defamation papers with the Wellington High Court, seeking a ruling that the language used in Maihi's petition defamed him. [28] Also in June 2018, community campaigner Laura O'Connell Rapira started a crowdfunding campaign for Maihi's legal costs. [29] The court hearing was set for 10 to 21 February 2020. In his initial cross examination, Jones admitted that he had never read the petition that he claims defames him. [30]
Maihi has one son, born in 2001. She identifies as bisexual and has been in a relationship with emerging First Nations Canadian filmmaker Judith Schuyler since 2017. [34]
| Year | Title | Writer | Director | Producer | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Redemption |  | Short Film | ||
| 2013 | Butterfly (Purerehua) | | | | Short Film |
| 2015 | Mannahatta | | | | Short Film |
| 2016 | Ka Puta, Ko Au | | | Short Film | |
| 2017 | Waru | | | Feature Film | |
| 2022 | We Are Still Here | | | Feature Film |
| Year | Result | Award | Category | Work | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Won | New Zealand Writers Guild Awards | Best Feature Film Script | Waru | [35] |
| 2018 | Won | Asia-Pacific Film Festival | Grand Jury Award | [36] | |
| Won | Seattle International Film Festival | Audience Award | [37] | ||
| Won | Wairoa Māori Film Festival | MANA WAIROA FESTIVAL PRIZE | [38] | ||
| 2022 | Won | imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival | Best Dramatic Feature Film | We Are Still Here | [23] |
Wairoa is the largest town in the Wairoa District and the northernmost town in the Hawke's Bay region of New Zealand's North Island. It is located on the northern shore of Hawke Bay at the mouth of the Wairoa River and to the west of Māhia Peninsula. It is 118 kilometres (73 mi) northeast of Napier, and 92 kilometres (57 mi) southwest of Gisborne, on State Highway 2. It is the nearest town to the Te Urewera protected area and former national park, which is accessible from Wairoa via State Highway 38. It is one of three towns in New Zealand where Māori outnumber other ethnicities, with 62.29% of the population identifying as Māori.
Sir Robert Edward Jones is a property investor, author and former politician in New Zealand. During the course of various political campaigns, he has developed a reputation for making highly controversial off-the-cuff remarks.
Nikola Jean Caro is a New Zealand film, television, and music video director and screenwriter. Her 2002 film Whale Rider was critically praised and won a number of awards at international film festivals. She directed the 2020 live action version of Disney's Mulan, making her the second female and the second New Zealand director hired by Disney to direct a film budgeted at over $100 million. Caro's works ranged from music videos, commercials, television dramas, and films, etc.
Peter David Broughton, generally known as Rawiri Paratene, is a New Zealand stage and screen actor, director and writer. He is known for his acting roles in Whale Rider (2002) and The Insatiable Moon (2010).
Ngā Tamatoa was a Māori activist group that operated throughout the 1970s to promote Māori rights, fight racial discrimination, and confront injustices perpetrated by the New Zealand Government, particularly violations of the Treaty of Waitangi.
Don Charles Selwyn was a Māori actor and filmmaker from New Zealand. He was a founding member of the New Zealand Māori Theatre Trust and directed the 2002 film Te tangata whai rawa o Weneti , the first Māori language feature film with English subtitles.
Merata Mita was a New Zealand filmmaker, producer, and writer, and a key figure in the growth of the Māori screen industry.
Briar Grace-Smith is a screenwriter, director, actor, and short story writer from New Zealand. She has worked as an actor and writer with the Maori theatre cooperative Te Ohu Whakaari and Maori theatre company He Ara Hou. Early plays Don't Call Me Bro and Flat Out Brown, were first performed at the Taki Rua Theatre in Wellington in 1996. Waitapu, a play written by Grace-Smith, was devised by He Ara Hou and performed by the group on the Native Earth Performing Arts tour in Canada in 1996.
Russian Snark is a 2010 New Zealand film directed and written by Stephen Sinclair and produced by Liz DiFiore. The film features Stephen Papps, Elena Stejko, Stephanie Tauevihi and Te Waimarie Kessell. It is the story of Misha, a Russian filmmaker, and his struggles to make a movie in Godzone. It is the directorial debut of New Zealand writer Stephen Sinclair.
Katie Wolfe is an actor, film and stage director from New Zealand. She appeared in television series including Marlin Bay (1990s), Shortland Street, and Mercy Peak. Her screen directing work has won awards, including Redemption at the ImagineNative Film + Media Arts Festival and This Is Her at the Prague International Short Film Festival. Wolfe wrote and directed a stage play, The Haka Party Incident that was presented in 2023 in New Zealand.
Stacey Morrison is a New Zealand television and radio host. Morrison speaks fluent Te Reo Māori and is active in promoting Māori language, culture and health.
Chelsea Jane Winstanley is a New Zealand film producer. She produces short films and documentaries which celebrate Indigenous peoples. She also produced the films What We Do in the Shadows and Jojo Rabbit.
Ainsley Amohaere Gardiner is a film producer from New Zealand.
The Adam NZ Play Award is an annual award in New Zealand given to new plays. There are a range of categories and submitted plays are read blind by a panel of industry professionals.
Waru is a 2017 New Zealand semi-anthology drama film about the tangi (funeral) of a small boy named Waru who dies at the hands of his caregiver, and how the boy's death impacts the community.
Miriama McDowell is a New Zealand actor, director and playwright. She is a graduate of Toi Whakaari.
The Antipodean Film Festival, variously referred to as Festival des Antipodes, Antipodes International Film Festival, Antipodes Film Festival Saint Tropez, Saint Tropez Film Festival and other variations, is a film festival showcasing New Zealand and Australian films, held annually in St Tropez in France since 1999.
Tearepa Kahi, also known as Te Arepa Kahi, is a New Zealand film director and former actor of Ngāti Paoa and Waikato Tainui descent. Kahi is best known for the 2013 drama Mt. Zion starring Stan Walker, and the Pātea Māori Club documentary Poi E: The Story of a Song (2016).
Armağan Ballantyne is a New Zealand film director. She is best known for her feature films The Strength of Water (2009) and Nude Tuesday (2022).
We Are Still Here is an Australian-New Zealand anthology film released in 2022. It includes eight strands by ten directors, and centres on stories relating to the indigenous peoples of both countries and how they have been impacted and continue to be affected by colonisation.