AUCKLAND (AUT University / Pacific Media Watch): A ground-breaking new investigative documentary about nickel mining on indigenous Kanak land and the environment in New Caledonia, Cap Bocage, will be released mid-year and feature in the Pacific Journalism Review political reportage conference in November.
Filmmaker Jim Marbrook, a television and screen production lecturer at AUT University, returned to New Caledonia last month to complete the final steps on the documentary.
"The main purpose of the visit was to go back and show the film to some of the participants and to finalise translations and music," Marbrook told Pacific Media Watch.
During the week of his visit, he consulted with experts in the Aije language at the Jean-Marie Tjibaou Centre in Noumea and met with many of participants in the documentary as well as the chief of the tribe of Ba, Gilbert Assawa.
Most of the music in the film has been composed and performed by Kanak musicians and several days of the trip were dedicated to catching up with them and finalising the music.
This music includes items that showcase the famous polyharmonies of Melanesian choral music and also tracks from the late Jacques “Kiki” Kare the revered activist, journalist and musician.
The documentary was the first project awarded a development grant by the then newly established Pacific Media Centre in 2007. The project also received other grants, including from the Creative New Zealand Fund.
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Jim Marbrook
