New Zealand is set to announce a first-of-its-kind Indigenous co-production initiative at the Toronto Film Festival, New Zealand Film Commission CEO Annie Murray tells Variety.
The pact will bring together Māori filmmakers from New Zealand, Aboriginal filmmakers from Australia and Indigenous Canadian filmmakers in a program of collaborative storytelling that none of the three countries could mount alone.
“They’re not beginning filmmakers, these are mid-career filmmakers who will collaborate together on stories, working in wānanga, we call them, but very intensive workshops together in each country,” Murray says.
The announcement is expected on Saturday, the same day NZFC head of funding Ainsley Gardiner — a filmmaker and Oscar nominee who served as a co-producer on the first Indigenous Canada-New Zealand co-production, “Night Raiders” (2021) — participates in the From Pitch to Partner: Global Co-Production Showcase alongside reps from Telefilm Canada and Eurimages.
For Murray, the initiative reflects a clear creative principle. “The real base of successful co-production is a shared creative purpose,” she says. “A strong base of mutual trust, creative alignment — it’s about creating something together that neither party could do on their own.”
