Actor Kevin Smith could do it all; from brooding like Brando in a Tennessee Williams play, through Xena, to the gentle romantic lead of Double Booking, and self-parody in Love Mussel. Collected here are selections from a career cut short (he died in a 2002 film-set accident). Plus tributes from James Griffin, Michael Hurst, Geoffrey Dolan and Simon Prast. 

This 2005 documentary tells the story of four New Zealand-born women whose parents come from villages in Samoa, Tonga and Niue. Social worker and photographer Emily Mafile'o, students and mothers Pule Puletaua and Lanni Liuvaie, and playwright Louise Tu’u face the challenges of combining two cultures to forge an identity in Aotearoa — from family, language, food and religion, to flatting and hair cutting rituals. As narrator Sandra Kailali says, "to be true to both is hard work: success in one often comes at a cost to the other." 

Artist Sam Hamilton describes his experimental feature as an “independent inquiry” into 10 celestial bodies found in The Milky Way. The Arts Foundation New Generation award-winner splices together images ranging from psychedelia to performance art to physics — shot on 16mm film across NZ and Samoa. The film's centrepiece is a sequence of dancer Ioane Papali’i with his limbs tethered to a tree. Newshub's Matthew Hutching praised Apple Pie's debut screening at the 2016 NZ Film Festival: “an absorbing, playful rumination on scientific patterns across our galaxy.”

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".

Dave Dobbyn in Concert is weighed strongly towards songs from Twist, the 1994 album that NZ Herald writer Graham Reid described as "breathtaking in its daring, ambition and reach". Dobbyn performs alongside a band which includes Twist producer Neil Finn. Although the offkilter soundscapes of the album are necessarily cut back on stage, Twist's strong musical bones remain clear. 'It Dawned on Me' showcases the curly-haired one in especially fine voice, while hit single 'Language' works wonders when stripped back to Dobbyn, Finn and twin acoustic guitars.

Inspired by an Australian musician who was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War, this song was first recorded by Aussie singer Ronnie Burns before Kiwi Craig Scott turned it into one of his biggest hits. Released in June 1971, Scott's version would go on to win the Loxene Golden Disc Award. These extended takes of Scott in action were likely cut together with footage taken from other angles — footage which is now missing in action. Thanks partly to regular appearances on music show Happen Inn, photos of Scott and his hair adorned bedrooms across the country in the early 1970s.

A Week of It was a pioneering comedy series that entertained and often outraged audiences over three series from 1977 to 1979. The writing team, led by David McPhail, AK Grant, Jon Gadsby, Bruce Ansley, Chris McVeigh and Peter Hawes, took irreverent aim at topical issues and public figures of the day. Amongst notable impersonations was McPhail's famous aping of Prime Minister Rob Muldoon; a catchphrase from a skit — "Jeez, Wayne" — entered NZ pop culture. The series won multiple Feltex Awards and in 1979 McPhail won Entertainer of the Year.  

Before he achieved worldwide fame as an actor, Sam Neill directed documentary films for the National Film Unit. This film examines the philosophy, early achievements and frustrations of one of New Zealand's most innovative architects, Ian Athfield. Athfield won an international competition in 1975 to design housing for 140,000 squatters in Manila, in the Philippines, yet struggled to gain recognition back home. This film culminates in Athfield's trip to the Philippines to pursue the project. Shooter John Toon later memorably shot feature film Rain.