Pictures
This quietly beautiful, moody film about relations between Maori and whites in Victorian New Zealand is the stylistic antithesis of the better known film Utu in its treatment of the same subject. Director Michael Black, a London Film School graduate, and producer and co-writer John O'Shea (Neglected Miracle, Leave All Fair) bring to life the archival photographs of Walter and Alfred Burton to tell the story of these two brothers who witness two very different New Zealands through their separate camera lenses. For Walter, the squalor and death rampant in the Maori villages as a result of the northern Land Wars demands to be documented; when he records the imprisonment of Maori rebels by colonial soldiers, his work is suppressed in no uncertain terms. His more expedient brother Alfred builds a career shooting the splendors of the land and the quaintness of its natives in photos meant for export to potential immigrants. Revealing the depths of despair which colonial bigotry brought to any who challenged the system, Pictures paints a stark image of the process of alienation, for the conquerers and conquered alike. Pictures was first shown at Cannes in 1981 and went on to win the press award at the Moscow Film Festival.