Presented by William Shatner, A Twist In The Tale was an anthology series with each episode featuring a new story for Shatner to tell a group of children gathered round the fireplace. In this adventure, a freak storm causes a strange girl (Westside's Antonia Prebble) to appear in a boy’s bedroom cupboard, only to discover she’s travelled back in time 100 years. When some futuristic technology goes missing and the family farm ends up on the line, the children must put their differences aside. The episode also features a memorable appearance by Craig Parker as the family's accountant.

A jandal-shod journey through Kiwi pop culture. Kiwiana takes a light-hearted look at the fashion, art, architecture, attitudes, and icons (Buzzy Bees, Edmonds, Swanndri, Pavlova etc) we call our own. Directed by Shirley Horrocks, and shot by Leon Narbey, it featured personalities Gary McCormick, Ginette McDonald, John Clarke, Peter Jackson, and others. Screening at a time (1996) when New Zealanders were just beginning to appreciate these neglected everyday objects as ‘collectibles,' it rated highly, and inspired a sequel, Kiwi As.

The second feature film directed by writer Anthony McCarten (Ladies' Night) is a small tale with some big themes. Set in a New Plymouth car yard, the film chronicles an endurance contest in which a car will be awarded to the person who manages to keep their hands on it the longest. As night falls, solo mother Jess (Melanie Lynskey) finds herself fending off the attentions of an obstinate competitor (Craig Hall), with a much harsher vision of the world than hers. Inspired by similar real-life contests, McCarten based the film on his novel Endurance.

The Insatiable Moon is the tale of a man with nothing but wisdom, joy and possibly a direct line to God. Arthur (Rawiri Paratene) wanders the streets of Ponsonby, where he finds perfection (Sara Wiseman) just as his community of boarding house friends faces threat. Producer Mike Riddell first wrote The Insatiable Moon as a 1997 novel, inspired by people he met while he was a clergyman in Ponsonby. The film’s extended development almost saw it made in England with Timothy Spall - before finally coming home, “on half a shoestring and a heap of passion”.

This 70s current affairs show does a cost benefit analysis of Trade Minister Warren Freer’s Maximum Retail Price scheme (MRP), which capped retail prices. Drawn from an era of economic theory poles that was apart from the market deregulation of the 80s, the investigation sets out to poll opinion in supermarket aisles, a grocery in Glenorchy, and factory floors (Faggs coffee, Cadbury chocolate). The checkouts are a battlefield between red tape and free range retail. The early animated sequence by Bob Stenhouse marked an early use of animation in a local TV documentary. 

TV personality Jaquie Brown plays (and plays up) herself for further delightful comic effect in the second series of The Jaquie Brown Diaries (renamed The Jaquie Brown Odyssey for DVD release). In the Qantas Award-winning TV3 satire Brown is an egomaniacal reporter looking to climb the media ladder any which way she can. This episode sees Brown googling herself, and a late-night forum post sends her spiralling towards celebrity booze binge self-destruction on K Road. In her wake Auckland’s Metro social pages set are skewered with self-referential glee.

This NFU production covers the Shah of Iran’s first tour downunder, and uses the occasion to showcase New Zealand to international viewers: from scenery to topdressing, dental clinics and Wellington Girls’ College. The four day visit could be seen as a symbol of globalisation: NZ had been cut adrift by Britain and was looking for markets for its lamb, cheese and wool, and to secure oil supplies. The Shah needed food for his modernising petroleum exporting country. (The booming trade was to be curtailed by the 1979 Iranian Revolution, when the Shah was exiled.)

Four decades before starring in The Last Samurai, New Zealand’s most symmetrical volcano stole the limelight in this NFU short. Extolling a mantra of progress and change, Taranaki presents New Plymouth as regional hub and suburban paradise, surrounded by bays and gladioli. Narrator Paul Ricketts touches on a conflict-soaked past by recalling his great grandmother’s nightly refuge in a central city stockade, during the 1860s Taranaki Wars. Back in 1954, a fishing license costs two pounds, and co-operatively-run dairy factories produce over half the nation’s cheese.

Peter Rowley and Pio Terei star in this 90s comedy sketch show. While Rowley is a veteran comedy actor famous for his roles alongside Billy T James in the hit Billy T James Show, this was Terei’s first lead television role (it was followed later by his own show Pio!).Each episode opens with a stand-up double act performed to a studio audience and closes with a song led by Terei. In these excerpts, the duo poke fun at racial stereotypes and create their own versions of well known contemporary advertisements. Just say ‘cheese’.  

Billed as "an unusual mix of realism and absurdity", Penny Black follows a materialistic supermodel (Astra McLaren) who is forced to become guardian to her superhero-obsessed sister. When the two set out from Auckland for Wellington so Penny Black can try to win back her modelling contract, they meet an anarchist who offers them a whole new angle on what really matters. Partly crowdfunded, partly improvised on location across the North Island, the chalk and cheese tale marked the big screen debut of Joe Hitchcock, who based it partly on road trips he'd taken as a teen.