And It Didn't Hurt One Bit
The sheep-fucking jokes all go eastwards. The South Africans think Australians fuck sheep. We think New Zealanders fuck sheep. New Zealanders of course think we fuck sheep, but they're easily persuaded it is indeed the South Africans who do; this is mostly on the strength of the 1995 Rugby World Cup where some South African chef poisoned the All-Blacks the night before the Grand Final. And so it is in that spirit that I just want to quickly jot down some thoughts on NZ.
Sheep? What Sheep?
Considering that we were headed out into the rural area of NZ, and what with all the sheep-fornicating jokes, I expected to see whole lot more sheep than I actually saw. Indeed, the farms and paddocks mostly featured cows. Loads of cows. And one bull, which was happily having its way witha cow as we drove by.
Hung Election
Who really gives a shit about elections? I do.
Who really gives a shit about other countries' elections. I do.
And it so happened the Kiwis were out to vote during my stay there. Interestingly enough they don't have compulsory voting there, which means the issues of state are open to being taken hostage by the extremists of all persuasion by pure dint that political extremists are more likely to vote than moderate, easy-going, less-motivated folks. With one of the lowest voter participations in their history, the fate of the next NZ government came down to nearly equal measures right-wingers and splinter-special interest groups on the other ledger.
The Partying On The Right Are Now Partying On The... Far Right
The funny thing about trends in world politics is that the Old Left has fragmented into a bunch of single-issue causes while the Old Right has steadily drifted towards less and less liberal ideas. I don't really know why, but I can take a guess and it is the fact that in a world that increasingly relies on mass-media to carry a soundbite as THE MESSAGE, it becomes easier to just say the simple shit, reagardless of the quality of the soundbite as fact or truth. So if Truth is the first casualty in War, well, it's certainly the first thing that gets knocked comatose in an election.
Who Are You Exactly?
The funniest group of all the splinter parties in NZ is New Zealand First, an aberrant bunch of nobodies fronted by one Winston Peters. Winston Peters is legendary for being totally self-serving and vain and venal. Sure enough, he doesn't let anybody else in his party talk to the press. 'NZ First' went to the polls promising they would back which ever off the major parties came out with more votes. In other words his promise was that he would be part of a coalition government no matter what the agenda. In practical terms, a vote for 'NZ First' would mean more confusion, not less confusion, but that didn't stop him taking this truly absurd position. It was hilarious.
In the end, Winston Peters lost his seat of 21 years, but for reasons only known to the devil himself, in spite of the self-evident stupidity of their position and promise,' New Zealand First' won 7 seats. What does one make of this? I don't know.
So Why Is It So Exciting?
Democracy is cool. It's the only time you can go out there and put your views on paper and make it count; short of picking up arms and taking to the sea of troubles. I mean, I can write here endlessly about the injustices of the world and all that crud but it just doesn't do as much as voting against the current incumbent bastard. Anyway, if you hate a politician, there's nothing like ballot to do the work of a bullet. And if you hate all politicians, then it's still worth putting that down on the ballot.
The New Zealand election revealed a whole lot more about the importance of compulsory voting in our own fragile democracy that keeps on getting subverted by bureaucrats and non-liberal Conservatives who would rather not let us have our say. We live in dangerous times when the hard-won fruits of history (such as separation of Church and State) are being rescinded by asshole governments around the world and we as the populace are doing jack-shit to stop these bastards from doing so. Seriously folks, if you don't like the way the world is run, you should take time to vote carefully.
Watching another country go through the motions really made me envious we won't be having a Federal Election for a long while and that the bastard incumbents will be in there, ruining our nation for a long time more.
And One More Thing About Traveling In Times Of Terror
I always get stopped at customs coming back to Australia. They always look at my passport and ask me asshole questions.
This time, a guy asked me if as a film-maker I'd made anything he'd know. I said, "not likely."
They asked, "how long have you been in your business?"
I said "twenty years."
"Twenty years in the business and nothing I've ever heard of?"
Fucken Jesus. I felt like saying: "Go catch a real terrorist or something. For fuck's sake, leave me alone, you stupid, stupid, stupid cunt."
But of course I didn't. That's why I'm writing it here instead. Custom officers really suck scrapie sheep cocks. If the film 'Max' is anything to go by, when I'm the dictator, I'm sending these SOBs to be made into lampshades first.
A Quick Note About Working With Geoff Murphy And Brian A. Williams
I promise to write more about this one day, but not tonight. I do want to report a couple of things. We holed up in Geoff's mountain cabin for 8 working days and knocked out a script we were all happy with. Now that's pretty amazing considering that we all have very different tastes and temperaments; and it wasn't exactly a camel by committee either. So I'm happy to report here the expedition was a great success.
I will report one funny anecdote. Geoff was working on the sound post of 'Under Siege 2' when in storms Steven Segal who starts to complain about the sound effect of a single gun. He says to Geoff that the specific type of gun used on screen does not make such a loud sound; but Geoff explains this is the movies and people expect to hear a dramatic bang when there's a dramatic bang on screen. Steven Segal huffs and puffs and says: "but I'm only interested in making realistic pictures."
...It's even funnier when you have seen the ending of that film. :)
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