Geoff Murphy by Geoff Murphy

Author:Geoff Murphy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2015-09-26T04:00:00+00:00

AFTER PORK PIE

By the middle of 1981, the Film Commission had part-funded about 10 films. All had modest to low budgets, and all performed reasonably well. Filmmakers rather than producers dominated most of these early Film Commission films. The last of this group was Roger Donaldson’s Smash Palace.

Smash Palace was a strange beast. Roger was so frustrated by the scriptwriting process he had experienced with making Sleeping Dogs that he decided he would write this one himself. It was not a good script, and the Commission, quite rightly, turned it down. But Roger was one of us. He was of that breed of filmmakers who are not easily put off. He believed in his film, and he believed in his script. So he rewrote and resubmitted it. Unfortunately, Roger only succeeded in making it different, not better, and so it was rejected again. I don’t remember how many times this cycle was repeated, but finally it got to ‘last chance’ territory. I’ve got to say that, in the tradition of government bodies of the time, the Film Commission was being remarkably stubborn. Everyone had expected them to give in a lot earlier. In 1980, when most of this was happening, Goodbye Pork Pie was yet to be released, and Roger was regarded by many as probably the best director in New Zealand. But directing is directing and writing is writing, and the script was still virtually unshootable. Bruno used to bring it home to Waimarama at that time, and I remember reading it. It was not pretty.

So the Film Commission rejected it. Roger left the room and slammed the door. Well, I presumed he slammed the door. I would have. John O’Shea was most upset with this result. He informed the Commission that they had just turned down the man who had made Sleeping Dogs, and that that film was probably more responsible than any other for there being a Film Commission at all. He also pointed out that Roger was one of the few people in the country who had demonstrated that he could pull off a feature film.

They decided to chase him. They ran down the stairs and caught a very dejected Roger on the street outside, and persuaded him to return.

As a result, Roger made one of the best New Zealand features ever made.

The script is a very important document. It is very rare for a good film to come from a bad script. The above story illustrates just how complex the equation is. Roger is an excellent director, but I don’t believe he had the genius to make that poor script into a brilliant movie. He had a different genius. He picked the people who would help him to transform that script. He picked exactly the right people, he picked them with unerring accuracy, and he knew when to listen to them. He picked Bruno Lawrence, Keith Aberdein, Mike Horton, Paul Leach, Derek Morton and others. These were not just excellent filmmakers; these were men of passion, talent, enthusiasm and belief.

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