Ruby and Rata

Ruby and Rata is a 110-minute riposte to anyone who claims that New Zealand cinema is dour and grim.

– Hamish McDouall, in his 2009 book 100 Essential New Zealand Films

No formula can create a film like this. No production values can make it succeed. These delicate, highly personal and fanciful little enterprises must ignite of their own accord, and Ruby and Rata somehow manages to do so.

– Reviewer Evan Williams in The Australian, 1992

[Gaylene] Preston and her team have woven a special kind of Kiwi magic in this one. I'd crawl across broken glass to see it again — and again.

– Peter Calder in an NZ Herald review, 28 September 1990