This is the first installment in director Jason Stutter’s trilogy of short cautionary tales. The ingredients are simple: playful kid, dangerous tool. The recipe for a comic screen gem? Mix them up. Here a son, left alone after watching his Dad chop wood, has a go at figuring out how a heavy axe works ... in bare feet. With the economy of a Buster Keaton set-up, Careful’s razor sharp sense of squeamish anticipation saw it become a festival success. It was apparently inspired by listening to Pink Floyd song ‘Careful with that axe, Eugene’ on a road-trip.

This collection celebrates the onscreen legacy of Sir Edmund Hillary — from triumphs of endurance (first atop Everest, tractors to the South Pole, boats up the Ganges) and a lifetime of humanitarian work, to priceless adventures in the NZ outdoors. Tom Scott and Mark Sainsbury — Ed’s TV biographers-turned-mates — offer their own memories of the man.

Australian Idol winner Stan Walker made his acting debut in this hit feature, as aspiring singer Turei. Part of a whānau of Māori potato pickers from Pukekohe, he has to choose between duty to job and family (Temuera Morrison plays his hard-working Dad) and letting the music play. His dilemma takes place as reggae star Bob Marley performs in Aotearoa in 1979, offering the chance for Turei's band Small Axe to win a supporting slot at Marley's Western Springs concert. Released on Waitangi Day 2013, Tearepa Kahi's debut feature became the most successful local release of the year.

In this series about butchery, Ken Hieatt dons his apron and saw to teach meat cutting skills in the home. Standing in front of two beef carcasses, Hieatt explains the tools of the trade and how to keep knives sharp. After sharpening his knife on a stone, Hieatt displays his skills by trimming his arm hairs. Hieatt assures the viewer that if you cut a beef carcass with his special technique, "you'll end up not 100% butcher but not too bad." State television produced several short programmes like this, from five to 15 minutes long, as show "fillers".

In this short a wandering flock of geese find harbour in a rainy day puddle. They give delight to Juliet, staring out the window of her state house until her axe-wielding neighbour approaches the birds with less sanguine intentions. She’s unimpressed when boyfriend Martin doesn’t act in order to avoid confrontation. When a family arrives looking for their pets, the neighbour shrugs off the enquiries, and it’s up to Martin to prove himself. Adapted from a story by Jo Sole, the Annalise Patterson-directed short was invited to Venice and Hof film festivals.

Godzone is “timber country” in this seventh slot in the New Zealand Now series. The NFU film looks at the world of the Kiwi bushman, as milling is providing the raw material for a postwar housing boom. The narrators provide a good keen guide to life in the remote and tiny (six houses) North Island town of Oraukura, where timber men fell giant native trees during the day and split kindling after work. For the men it’s a hard, but good life; for their wives it’s “pretty dull”. The Axemen’s Carnival in Taumarunui features OSH-unsanctioned woodchopping in socks. 

Bill Sevesi was the 'Godfather' of Polynesian music in New Zealand; his impact can be heard in the strum of ukeleles in classrooms across the country. In this 24-minute film Sevesi (born Wilfred Jeffs) narrates his life story, including his childhood in Tonga, making his first guitar, and his role in bringing Pacific Island music into the dance halls of 1940's and 50's New Zealand. Sevesi's bands mixed Hawaiian steel guitar with pop tunes of the day, resulting in sunny hits like 'Kissing Hula'. Watch out for uke player Sione Aleki, Tonga's answer to Jimi Hendrix.

"This is what happens when jocks meet geeks." That's how a modern knight defines the brutal sport of medieval combat. Participants don armour, swords and battle axes to fight each other, with the hope of representing New Zealand. The documentary's eccentric cast — including rookie Nick Waiariki and Steel Thorns captain Martainn 'The Machine' Cuff — have to overcome an array of obstacles, including a fear of wolves. Directors Andy Deere and Ryan Heron made this film as a follow-up to their 2016 Loading Doc short film of the same name. 

From Māori myth to climbing and photography, to gliding and paraponting around its peak, Aoraki-Mt Cook is vividly captured in all its moods in this award-winning NHNZ portrait. Filmed for the centenary of the first ascent of a mountain that has claimed over 100 lives, it follows mountaineers as they climb toward the summit, re-enacting Tom Fyfe's pioneering pre-crampon route. Climbers, including Edmund Hillary, reminisce about encounters with NZ's highest and most iconic peak; and Bruce Grant takes the quick way down: a vertiginous ski descent.

This 1972 NFU documentary follows three climbers (Hugh Canard, Neil Hamilton and pioneering guide Bruce Jenkinson) on an ascent of Mt Aspiring. Directed and photographed by Grant Foster (Land of Birds), the beautifully-shot short film heads up country in the Land Rover. Rivers are crossed in the sun, then the climbers rope up and get the pick axes out. It’s tea, food and harmonica in the hut, then a pre-dawn start (“hell it’s cold!”) before cutting steps and leaping crevasses up the “matterhorn of the south”. The film screened on PBS in the United States.