This Feltex Award-winning documentary dives, abseils and squeezes under the mountain — Mt Arthur in Kahurangi National Park — to record the exploration of the subterranean world of the Nettlebed Cave System. At nearly one kilometre underground the system is New Zealand’s deepest cave, and a mecca for cavers from around the world. The cavers relay their motivations and anxieties as they negotiate the uncharted water-carved limestone labyrinth. Directed by Ian Taylor, it screened in the Lookout series. Claustrophobes beware: there are no lattes at Soft Rock Cafe.

It started with grunge and ended with Spice Girls; Di died, Clinton didn't inhale and the All Blacks were poisoned. On screen, Ice TV and Havoc were for the kids and a grown-up Kiwi cinema delivered a powerful triple punch. Tua's linguistic jab proved just as memorable, Tem got a geography lesson and Thingee's eye popped and reverberated around our living rooms.

A big budget New Zealand-French-Australian co-production, kidult series Deepwater Haven screened on TV2. It followed the fortunes of Waitemata Harbour tugboat skipper Jack Wilson (Vince Martin of Beaurepairies advertising fame) and his two kids, Georgie (Jay Saussey) and Peter (Peter Malloch). This opening episode sees Jack struggling to keep his business afloat; the local cafe is burgled; and Peter, marooned at a dry dock while on the run from bullies, is rescued by a street kid (future Pluto singer Milan Borich). Saussey won a NZ Film and TV Award for her role.

Howard Morrison visits France for the first time in this two-part Kiwi production, made to mark the bicentenary of Bastille Day. His tour of French culture begins on the Champs-Élysées on the big day itself, then ranges from Napoleon to Notre Dame, with visits to the Musée de l’Homme to see taonga, plus crepe-flipping and Parisian cabaret (where he belts out a song onstage). When the Māori leaves Metro range, it’s fishing in Neuvic and ‘Pokarekare Ana’ accompanied by accordion. In Corrèze he meets another Kiwi, and uses a minitel (an early version of the world wide web).

This is the first of a two-part "money and greed" morality tale set in a Rogernomics-era 'New Auckland' of property deals and horse racing. Working class lass Tammy (Annie Whittle) and art consultant Joanna (Miranda Harcourt, fresh from Gloss) are an unlikely duo who inherit a racehorse and a greasy spoon cafe (instant coffee rather than cappuccino). Brit import James Faulkner plays a shady developer whose scheme is blocked by the duo. Murder, underhand unitary plans, yuppie love and old gambling debts complicate life for Tammy and Joanna.

Jane Sherning Warren’s satirical portrait of the artist as a young woman was one of a series of short films exploring life on the colourful K Road strip. Jaded Arlette (Morgan Albrecht) endures a barrage of art-speak as her posse saunters from her Artspace exhibition opening to Verona Cafe. When the ridiculous art theory of her partner leaves truth far behind, she challenges his cred, and a chase ensues. A drag queen with a pool cue comes to her rescue, and she (and the audience) get an unexpected lesson in how people's identity is a performance.

Presented by restaurateur and two time Auckland mayoral candidate John Palino, Top Shelf’s The Kitchen Job visited restaurants and cafes around New Zealand that were in need of help. Palino is a self-proclaimed “restaurant fixer”, who brings his experience from working in his native New York. From Invercargill to Onehunga, he takes on and comes to the aid of eateries across the country. While a number are cases of investments gone bad and family businesses on the line, not all the problems are quite so ordinary; as evidenced by one haunted restaurant down south.

Director Dave Gibson heads to Wellington's red light district on Vivian Street to interview strippers and prostitutes for this TV One documentary. Night workers ply their trade on the busy street, and inside late night venues like Tiffany's strip club. The nearby Evergreen cafe is also used as a drop-in centre by the city's gay community. Prostitute Kayla talks about AIDS reducing client numbers, while stripper Crystal Lee is nervous before her first dance. Police mention an improved relationship with prostitutes; Tiffany's owner Brian Le Gros claims men visit his club for fun not nudity.

This teleplay from writer Greg McGee is a satire of prejudice and the market economy set in the grey, divisive atmosphere of early 1980s New Zealand. Kate Harcourt plays the proprietor of Dot's Terminal Cafe, a cantankerous spinster who rails against 'bludgers' and 'foreigners'. One rain-soaked Wellington night, her lumpen clientele decide to stage a small but telling uprising — with the help of a dead mouse. It screened in early 1982, following the breakout success of McGee’s confrontational take on Kiwi conformity: rugby player losing-his-religion play Foreskin’s Lament.

This two-part mini-series is set in an 80s 'New Auckland' world of mirror glass and murderous corporate conspiracy. British actor James Faulkner (latterly Bridget Jones' Uncle Geoffrey) plays a shady developer with a smash and burn approach to urban planning. Blocking his utopian waterfront scheme is a cafe. The inheritors of the greasy spoon — and a racehorse — are a duo of feisty femmes: working class Tammy (Annie Whittle), and art consultant Joanna (Miranda Harcourt). The Shadow Trader marked an early producing credit for Finola Dwyer (An Education).