Among the Cinders

Maurice Shadbolt stepped up to play the father of the main character in this adaptation of his acclaimed coming-of-age novel. Blaming himself for the death of a Māori friend, teenager Nick (Paul O’Shea) escapes his parents to visit his grandparents. Nick and his misfit grandpa (Derek Hardwick) set out to visit old haunts, and Nick finds romance. The opening clip features Shadbolt and Bridget Armstrong as Nick's parents. In the second, Nick and his grandpa negotiate with Ahu (Tama Poata) over some horses, then head into the hills. Shot partly in Golden Bay, the German-Kiwi co-production was directed by German Rolf Hädrich.  

[Director] Rolf [Hädrich] had made many good films which were artistic and popular with German audiences . . . Rolf was now trying to make a cinema feature, like many of those young directors he had trained in his earlier years at Norddeutscher Rundfunk. They had been successful — why shouldn’t he? A foreign location, exotic people — why not?

– Producer/co-writer John O'Shea, in his 1999 book Don't Let it Get You, page 147

Key Cast & Crew

Rebecca Gibney

As: Sally

Paul O'Shea

As: Nick Flinders

Maurice Shadbolt

Original Author, As: Frank Flinders (Nick's father)

Derek Hardwick

As: Hubert Flinders

John O'Shea

Producer, Writer

Rolf Hädrich

Director, Writer