Pietra Brettkelly is always chasing her next idea and her latest project, Crocodile, has been bubbling away for more than four years. Crocodile tells the story of nine brothers, sisters and cousins aged five to 19 who live in a small town of Kaduna (English translation is Crocodile), in the middle of Nigeria. The group of youngsters are writing their own narrative and making unique sci-fi films. Pietra’s film follows their journey as they follow their path into filmmaking.

“I don’t remember when I came across the story of these incredible young people, but once I read about them I tracked them down, managed to get hold of them and then headed to Nigeria and started filming.

“I hung out with them and tried to show I was genuine about making this film, and I’ve just been trusting my gut instincts.”

That was in October 2019 – with incredible foresight Pietra left a camera with the group and after Covid-19 prevented her from returning to the West African nation, they have been documenting their story.

Pietra connects with them weekly and says she’s constantly amazed by the explosion of creativity she sees happening in front of the camera. “They say I’m always ‘in their head’.”

Well-known film producer Chelsea Winstanley has joined the project as producer and Pietra says they are creating a model of co-ownership and co-producership of the doco with the young Nigerian filmmakers known collectively as The cRiTiCs.

The cRiTiCs have gained international attention with JJ Abrams gifting them a supply of film equipment, Morgan Freeman producing their short film Tomorrow’s War which premiered at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and their work has screened at MoCADA in New York and they are in Frankfurt preparing for an exhibition of their short sci-fi films at the Museum of Modern Art, Frankfurt.

“They are truly incredible and they are so determined not to be sucked into the prospects of a number of Nigerian youth – drug running and scamming.”

Pietra has recently raised funds through a Boosted campaign to help with the final filming and editing and adds that she will be exploring elements of magical realism with the film, and hopes to have the film premiere at Cannes Film Festival in the near future.

You can donate to help Pietra complete the film. Contact Pietra here

Since receiving the Dame Gaylene Preston Award for Documentary Filmmakers, and being named an Arts Foundation Laureate in 2021, Florian Habicht spent time completing the colourised version of Woodenhead which screened at NZIFF 2021 in Wellington and NZIFF 2022 in Auckland. It will be released on AroVision for streaming on Good Friday. Click here.

Florian's since been turning his focus to other projects. Seven years ago he read Viki King's book 'How To Write A Movie In 21 Days'.  Now (not quite 21 days) Florian has almost completed the screenplays for two dramatic features, and hopes and dreams he can film Under a Full Moon in Aotearoa next year with producer Lani-rain Feltham. Florian is keeping mum on the details but told us both projects will take his filmmaking to the next level.

In other news, Isey Cross, New Zealand's oldest movie star (from Florian's documentary James & Isey – Aotearoa's biggest NZ doco at the box office in the last five years!) just celebrated her 104th birthday!

Like most of us, Florian feels that the last few years have been strange, and challenging on many levels, and he sends love out to everyone reading this!