This postwar Weekly Review joins a welfare officer from the Crippled Children’s Society on her Wellington rounds: advising parents, chaperoning children to hospitals to undergo physical and speech therapy, and overseeing the supply of specialist footwear and splints. There’s also a Kiwi take on Heidi as a boy is offered a farm holiday, walking on crutches among the cows: “No care and treatment can substitute for the uplift of two weeks in the country.” Released in September 1948, the film was made by decorated war correspondent Stan Wemyss (grandfather of Russell Crowe).

“Real patients, real drama: real emergencies.” This 2007 series goes behind the scenes of the Emergency Department at Wellington Hospital, focusing on the medical staff who treat patients in most urgent need of treatment. In this opening episode, a zookeeper is mauled by a lion, an infant fights for his life, and a patient has chopped his basil too finely. Produced by Greenstone productions (The Zoo, Border Patrol) the 12-part series won the Best Observational Reality Award at the 2007 Qantas Television Awards. 

This 2013 TVNZ Heartland series saw veteran newsreaders present major moments in New Zealand history. In this episode Dougal Stevenson looks back at the Wahine disaster of 10 April 1968, when 51 people perished after the interisland ferry struck Barrett Reef near Wellington, in a southerly storm. Stevenson was a junior newsreader at the time. Along with archive footage, two eyewitnesses are interviewed: passenger William Spring, who recalls leaping from the capsized ship; and Roger Johnstone, who describes filming the disaster as a young NZBC cameraman.

Nightly magazine-style show Town and Around played on New Zealand screens during the second half of the 60s. Hosted by Peter Read, this end-of-1968 special from the Wellington edition showcases highlights from over 500 items that year. The concentration is on lighter material, most famously a hoax piece on a farmer who puts gumboots on his turkeys. In another piece reporter John Shrapnell discovers that locked cars in the city tend to be the exception. Also featured: an interview with entertainer Rolf Harris, and an impromptu Kiwi street-Hamlet.

Before X Factor there was New Faces, before Masterchef ... Graham Kerr, before Country Calendar there was ... er, Country Calendar. This collection picks the screen gems from the decade that gave Kiwi pop culture, "miniskirts, teenagers — and television." Peter Sinclair, Sandy Edmonds, Howard Morrison, and Ray Columbus star. Do your mod's nod and C'mon! 

Just days after finding out he had bowel cancer, Wellington actor Peter Vere-Jones invited a film crew to document his journey through the treatment process to the final outcome. This is a highly personal, and at times harrowing, account of a man coming to terms with his mortality. The documentary puts the audience squarely in Vere-Jones' corner. Although much of the doco is filmed inside Wellington Hospital, Vere-Jones' wit and insight paints a picture of a life far beyond those walls.

Greenstone Productions are prolific and award-winning makers of observational reality shows (The Zoo, Border Patrol, Coastwatch). This series saw their cameras go behind the scenes of Wellington Hospital's Emergency Department, to showcase the skills and compassion of medical staff as they treat patients ranging from lost diver Rob Hewitt and a near-fatally inebriated man, to the ubiquitous broken bones and beads stuck up nostrils. The 12-part series won the Best Observational Reality (non-format) Award at the 2007 Qantas Television Awards.

Six Māori Battalion soldiers camped in Italian ruins wait for night to fall. In the silence, the bros-in-arms distract themselves with jokes. A tohu (sign) brings them back to reality, and they gather to say a karakia before returning to the fray. Director Taika Waititi describes the soldiers as young men with "a special bond, strengthened by their character, their culture and each other." Shot in the rubble of the old Wellington Hospital, Tama Tū won international acclaim. Invited to over 40 international festivals, its many awards included honourable mentions at Sundance and Berlin.

The darkly arresting imagery of this Fanatics video — featuring leather clad models marching in robotic unison — was almost not to be, according to director Mark Albiston. "The band said 'do what you want — but no models'. I said 'what if we put them in jars'? They said...'mmmm... ok'." This swift negotiation lead to an industrial setting (the generator room under Wellington Hospital), with an army of models being baptised, energised and commercialised. The song was later used as the opening theme for New Zealand's Next Top Model.