Havoc and Newsboy took the malarky of their 90s youth show on the road in this 1999 series. This episode sees the pair talking intelligence. In Wellington they spy on Keith Quinn, simulate an earthquake and hang out outside Defence HQ with journalist Nicky Hager, to talk SIS surveillance and silver protective curtains. The intrepid duo follow Hager's leads to "the most secret place in New Zealand": the Waihopai intelligence base near Blenheim. “We went and did a dance, trespassed and left our masks on the front gate”. On the ferry en route, Newsboy pays homage to song 'Montego Bay'. 

The Five Eyes spy network was set up after WWll to monitor and share intelligence between the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand. According to this interactive documentary, the network sought a new justification for its existence after the Soviet Union's collapse, and found it in digital communications. Narrated by Lucy Lawless, I Spy aimed to inform viewers about just what their local intelligence agencies are up to. Interviewees included author Nicky Hager and ex NSA/CIA director Michael Hayden. I Spy was funded by a joint Canadian-NZ Digital Media Fund.  

This documentary questions New Zealand’s involvement in the ‘Five Eyes’ intelligence alliance. The examination of contemporary intelligence gathering takes in NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden, entrepreneur-in-exile Kim Dotcom, and NZ Prime Minister John Key. It is framed around the 2008 sabotage of a Blenheim spy station by a priest, a teacher and a farmer: the 'Waihopai three' cut open a plastic dome protecting a satellite dish, in protest at the base’s role in the US-led 'War on Terror'. Directors Errol Wright and Abi King-Jones made 2011 terror raids documentary Operation 8.

Away Laughing was an early sketch comedy show for both TV3 and Wellington production company Gibson Group. In this first episode from the second series, spies, skateboarders, Kiwi mateship, and All Black Buck Shelford are the butt of jokes. Along the way, Murray Keane plays both an Australian mocking New Zealand place names, and a true blue Kiwi; a trio of firefighters make idiots of themselves in a classroom; kids argue about the best kind of lunch; and onetime Telecom promo man Gordon McLauchlan (David Downs) interviews two gorillas about Telecom's privatisation.

This 1966 edition of National Film Unit’s magazine slot heads to Christchurch International Airport to explore weather measuring devices being launched there. Helium 'Ghost Balloons' are sent into the sky by an outpost of the United States' National Center for Atmospheric Research. Meanwhile Christchurch weathermen send up hydrogen balloons, read satellite data, and provide a flight plan for a U2 reconnaisance plane from the US Air Force. The pilot’s preflight routine involves breathing pure oxygen to prepare him for the ultrahigh altitude plane’s steep ascent into the sky.

In this March 2015 episode of long-running magazine-style show Tagata Pasifika, Sandra Kailahi explores the factors that lead some young pasifika mothers to abandon their newborns. Then hosts Marama T-Pole and Tom Natoealofa interview actor Teuila Blakely, who had her son at 17, about what it was like being a teenage mother, and what needs to change to support others in that situation. Also featured are stories about the Samoan King’s son converting to the Mormon faith, and allegations New Zealand has been conducting surveillance on its Pacific neighbours.

In July 1985 French government agents bombed Greenpeace vessel The Rainbow Warrior while it was moored at an Auckland wharf. The boat was set to protest French nuclear testing at Mururoa; photographer Fernando Pereira was killed. This TVNZ documentary, which screened in April 1986, explores the international incident and its fallout. This excerpt, featuring dramatic reconstructions, covers the arrival of the spies in New Zealand and their movements up to and after the bombing. Witnesses and key figures, such as Prime Minister David Lange, are interviewed.

The Alpha Plan involves a British spy down under, investigating strange deaths among a Mensa-like group of the planet's brightest brains (meeting on Pakatoa Island!). Made when jet-setting Cold War thrillers were all the rage, the ambitious series involved roughly 120 actors, and was NZ's first drama series to emerge, after occasional one-off plays. This first meet-and-greet episode builds to a memorable finale, after introducing us to key players: an English geology professor, a curious journalist, and a mysterious American who rings after dark with shocking news.

This concert from May 1983 finds Dance Exponents — one of five bands filmed for a Radio with Pictures live series — with their star on the rise, but yet to release their debut album. An irrepressible Jordan Luck and band mates Dave Gent, Brian Jones and Mike Harralambi perform six songs in front of an enthusiastic full house, at Auckland's premier venue Mainstreet Cabaret. Highlights include a sparse, urgent 'Victoria' and a barnstorming 'Airway Spies'. Opening song 'Perfect Romance' was only ever released in this version on a companion live album.

Annie Goldson’s documentary examines the story of Kim Dotcom, the German-born hacker turned internet mogul who is holed up in a New Zealand mansion fighting extradition to the United States. In the US he’s wanted for alleged infringement of copyright laws committed by Megaupload, the online storage hub he founded. Goldson mines archive material (including the NZ police raid of his mansion) and interviews, to explore intellectual property, privacy, profit and piracy in the digital age. The film won rave reviews after its world premiere at multimedia festival South by Southwest.