More often than not, the gateway to the world’s most exciting cinema lies to the East. Curating and stewarding that pathway for NZIFF in recent years has been an international star – Vicci Ho, who joined the NZIFF as a guest curator in 2020.

Her programming represented the minutiae of everyday life across the world’s broadest collection of cultures. Vicci has a genealogist’s grasp of the whakapapa of each region and a command of the multitude of styles of expression and genre throughout Asian cinema, past and present. And she served them up with the inclusion of high level Q&A sessions whenever possible.

In 2023, audiences at ASB Waterfront Theatre, The Civic and Roxy Cinemas got to feast on the Atayal film Gaga and the film the world is still talking about, Past Lives, through the words and wisdom of Vicci as she led us deeper into the stories behind the stories with Laha Mebow and Celine Song, in person.

While many of our programmers have had long storied relationships with our festival, Vicci was more recent, joining via the invitation of Marten Rabarts. But in such a short time — three festivals — Vicci made a long-lasting contribution. E rere atu nei, ko ngā tai o mihi.

Nic Marshall, founder of the Square Eyes Film Foundation, has been a tireless advocate for young cinema audiences in New Zealand for nearly two decades. NZIFF has had the privilege of collaborating with Nic on our all ages programming since 2005. 

She was also the driver behind NZIFF for Schools, a programme which included short films, animated shorts and feature films curated to engage and inspire school-aged tamariki. This outreach programme expanded to five centres in 2023, with great success.

Nic’s programmes have opened the eyes of young audiences to the wonders of international cinema and the connection of the big-screen, communal filmgoing experience. Hearing the oohs, aahs and spontaneous applause at Nic’s Animation for Kids screenings year after year has been one of the true joys of the festival. 

We are confident that Nic Marshall and Square Eyes will continue to enrich New Zealand film culture for years to come.

A key member of the team that enlivens our winters, Sandra Reid has alerted New Zealand festival audiences to a dream run of European features and documentaries over almost 30 years since 1995 – scouting, viewing and recommending choice titles for the Festival programme.

From Berlin to Cannes, Amsterdam to London, Sandra (formally based in Paris for part of the year) has done the hard yards for us all, selecting and recommending not only the prize winners that will easily find an audience, but also the niche films that people would not otherwise find themselves.

This requires an open mind, good instincts, good judgement and above all an understanding of the audience. Her contribution to building the trust of the NZIFF audience cannot be underestimated. Nor her role in the expanding diversity of supporters the festival enjoys.

And let’s not forget her earlier work as a publicist for the Festival, her persuasive programming notes and her side hustle as an energetic and generous host for local and international guests over several years, notably deep into the night at the Matterhorn and Motel.

In 2004, after a decade serving up joyous mayhem to “gonzo cinephiles”, Ant Timpson and his Incredibly Strange Film Festival were lured by Bill Gosden into the NZIFF tent.

In that year’s souvenir programme, Gosden praised Timpson and his “outlaw” enterprise for “distinctive infusions into the culture of the land” – which is one way of describing feats such as leaping on stage dressed as Anna Paquin and smashing up a piano with a sledgehammer.

Timpson’s strand in the festival quickly became a beloved, heavily dog-eared part of the programme, showcasing the arresting, iconoclastic and brilliant extremities of global filmmaking. 

As he established himself as a formidable filmmaker in his own right, Timpson continued to light up the festival with a collection of freakish, funny and unforgettable titles, all powered by an inimitable, irrepressible love of cinema.

Animation expert Malcom Turner has enlivened the film festival with his collections of short films (and occasional features) for 25 years.

In the mid-1990s Malcolm left behind earlier careers in the military and aviation to pursue a passion for the quirkier spectrums of arts curation and management. This brought him to Wellington as the Director of the Fringe Festival where his eye for the unusual caught the attention of NZIFF Director Bill Gosden who invited him to become our Animation Programmer. Since then each year he has contributed between one to six Animation Now! curated collections representing the best of the thousands of films Malcolm saw every year and covering a vast stylistic and cultural range.

Seasoned festivalgoers were well aware that many of our most innovative, beautiful and just plain funny films lurked within his programmes, and that Malcolm could reliably shock and awe us with things we’d never seen before and might never see again.

We have benefitted immensely from Malcolm’s depth of knowledge and vast international contacts in the field of animation, and wish him all the best with his continued work in the world of academia and as Director of the Melbourne International Animation Festival and Co-Director of the Australian and London International Animation Festivals.