Stickmen

Stickmen is vital, refreshing and sure plays a mean pool ball.

– NZ Herald reviewer Russell Baillie in a four star review, 20 January 2001

I'm going to sit down for a day or two and think up a really unique form of retribution, something really special, Dave, just for you. And maybe you could use that time to see if you can get me my money and divert my attentions elsewhere.

– 'Daddy' (Enrico Mammarella) to bar owner Dave (John Leigh)

The rules are simple. The balls you go after are decided by the one you sink first: spots or stripes, overs or unders, whatever you want to call them. You always hit your own balls.

– Holden (Kirk Torrance)

Wayne's great. He's a simple boy...from the Lower Hutt.

– Actor Scott Wills describes his chaarcter Wayne, in documentary The Making of Stickmen

He's one of the very few . . . classically good-looking actors in New Zealand who are humble enough to sort of make their character flawed, which Jack is  . . .  Jack had the propensity to become unlikeable because of his rogueish nature with women, but the way Robbie played him you really liked his charm.

– Stickmen director Hamish Rothwell on casting Robbie Magasiva as Jack, in The Making of Stickmen

Holden is the consequences basically . . . Pool's a metaphor for life for Holden, and you break the rules, and Holden's the consequences.

– Kirk Torrance describes his character, in documentary The Making of Stickmen

A hip-looking, well-packaged production, Stickmen benefits from d.p. [director of photography] Nigel Bluck’s lively shooting style, bathing the shadowy pub and pool hall interiors in deep, high-contrast colors; and from the brisk pace sustained by editor Owen Ferrier-Kerr’s vigorous cutting.

– Variety reviewer David Rooney, 18 May 2001