Draft 2 PhD Introduction - ResearchSpace@Auckland

91
cinematography looks forward to the style of A State of Siege”. 307 In 1977, Ward
directed and shot (in conjunction with Euan Frizzell) Ma Olsen, a 15-minute
documentary on one of the local “characters” living in the country outside Greytown,
close to where he grew up. The subject of the film was an eccentric elderly woman who
lived with numerous animals including cats, rooster, hens, and sheep. Coulson, who
edited the film, recollects that the documentary was “a sort of exploration of her space
and her world, but it also showed her incredible pragmatism about the world, about
how, if anything was sick you just kill it”. 308 The film, shot on 16mm colour stock, and
made with the assistance of the Education Department and TV One, prefigured the
subject-matter of In Spring One Plants Alone in its exploration of the world of an
elderly woman who is an outsider from society.
In the same year, Ward worked as cameraman on a film directed by White, entitled
Samir, a six-minute film also shot on 16mm colour stock. 309 White describes the film
as being “sort of sensuous, I wouldn’t say erotic, but a very beautiful lyrical piece. It’s
just of a young boy somewhat voyeuristically looking at his pregnant mother and his
father. But it looked amazing and Vincent brought incredible visual design to the very
limited set that was constructed […], and the way it was shot […]. We had almost no
equipment. It was really so rudimentary”. 310 The following year, Ward made the film
that established him as an outstanding young director, A State of Siege. Although it was
a “student film” and only fifty-two minutes long, after it premiered at the Wellington
Film Festival in 1978, it was given cinema release in Wellington, and later screened at
repertory theatres in various parts of the USA (along with In Spring One Plants Alone),
where it received several awards. The film was made on a shoestring budget, funded by
Ward and White (who produced the film), with small amounts of money from the Arts
Council, the Education Department and the Interim Film Commission. (Obtaining this
funding for a student film showed unusual initiative.)
White describes the film as stemming from “a quite exciting collaboration. We were
both discovering just how to make movies. Truthfully, there was no real lecturer there.
307
Horrocks’ information for the Filmography came from Ward himself since these films also appear to
be lost
308
Lynette Read, interview with David Coulson, 16 August 2002.
309
The NZ Film Archive has a copy of the negative A and B rolls of Samir, and the camera original and
sound negatives of Ma Olsen, but neither film is able to be viewed in its present state.
310
Lynette Read, interview with Timothy White, 29 September 1999.