Draft 2 PhD Introduction - ResearchSpace@Auckland

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production, in Australia it is often seen as an Australian film, despite most of the talent
and locations belonging to New Zealand. Ward himself is adamant that it should be
seen as a New Zealand film. 811 However, The Navigator’s status “as the peak
achievement of New Zealand’s film culture” has been the subject of debate among New
Zealand critics, as Chris Watson has pointed out. 812 He sees it as having been
championed locally as a way to advance the case for art cinema generally, as an
alternative to the greater box-office success of more populist films such as Goodbye
Pork Pie (Geoff Murphy, 1980) or Came a Hot Friday (Ian Mune, 1984). Watson is
interested in the way international awards serve to ensure that when such a film “is
screened in New Zealand, that portion of society which would not regularly go to the
cinema as part of a popular culture experience will make the effort to attend as part of
an elite cultural experience”. 813 His comment fits perfectly with Maynard’s admission
that his marketing strategy for Ward’s films was to gain overseas critical recognition so
that the local audience might overcome its cultural cringe. But Ward himself had a
different perspective. He refused to accept the idea that ‘art film’ was the antithesis of
‘popular film’ and stated that his aim in The Navigator was to reach a wide rather than
an art house audience – “not only through the comedy. It’s a tale, and the intention was
that you could enter the story at your own level, and draw from it at your own level”. 814
He described the film as “basically an adventure story. It’s meant to be acceptable.
Hopefully it can work for a range of audiences”. 815 The film’s references to other
genres, particularly science fiction, and its comedic characters such as Ulf, had a
potential appeal for young audiences. The relatively large budget of The Navigator
certainly encouraged Ward to seek a larger audience; and the combination of Cumbria
and New Zealand encouraged international distribution. The flaw in Ward’s conception
of the film as working on many levels was its failure to work consistently on the level of
orthodox narrative (as McDonnell’s, Watson’s, or Bollinger’s response shows).
Some New Zealand critics focussed on the “European feel” of The Navigator and
compared it to the work of European directors such as Tarkovskij, or to Bergman’s The
811
Ward quoted in Calder, "The Navigator: Vincent Ward's Four Year Odyssey," 1.
812
Chris Watson, "The Navigator," Sites: A Journal for Radical Perspectives on Culture and Art.20
(1990): 141.
813
Chris Watson, "New Zealand Feature Films: Their State and Status," New Zealand Sociology 3.2
(1988): 89.
814
Ward quoted in Campbell and Bilbrough, "A Dialogue with Discrepancy: Vincent Ward Discusses the
Navigator," 11.
815
Werner, "A Mediaeval Craft," 20-21.