New role working like a charm

Sara Wiseman.

Murders, armed robberies, prostitution and P labs have meant Manurewa has been on the telly a bit lately, but the latest footage of the South Auckland suburb has little to do with crime.

Jinx Sister, a new film by Auckland director Athina Tsoulis, focuses more on the poverty of the soul of main character Laura Martin, played by New Zealand actor Sara Wiseman, whose credits include Sione's Wedding, Mercy Peak and Outrageous Fortune.

Laura is a complex character. She thinks she is a jinx, courtesy of a childhood remark made by sister Mairie following the death of their father. The girls' aggrieved mother then drinks herself to death, precipitating a long-time sibling rift.

Having spent 10 years in Los Angeles and done little more than plumb the depths of her own alcoholism, Laura returns to Manurewa only to discover she has to let go of her past in order to embrace her future.

Jinx Sister, inspired by a friend of the director who'd lost both parents as a child while living in South Auckland, thus deals in big themes. Love, loss, fear and secrets are at the heart of the story and, in conjunction with the complicated nature of Laura, are what lured Wiseman to the project, she explains from her central Auckland home.

Having grown up in the East Auckland suburb of Howick, Wiseman admits she has not spent much time in Manurewa, but warmed to Tsoulis' idea of reversing stereotypes. In Jinx Sister, the key Polynesian male characters have life "sussed", are calm, in control of their emotions and can see through Laura's sad veneer, which mixes self-loathing, image-consciousness and a sex-equals-power ideal.

"What I like about the male characters are they are really on to it: they are genuine, loving, intelligent guys."

Tsoulis' developed her script over 10 years. Yet it took Wiseman just a few hours to read it and decide to take on the role.

"I sat down in one session and read it from go to whoa, which is a really strong sign for me . . . I believed in the characters. It has some very big themes, but they are not shoved down your throat and they are not shown in big, sensationalist way.

"For me, it's the things behind the people; how they will try to avoid the dark stuff in their world, whether that is referring to drugs or sex or running a marathon, whatever it is they choose to do in order to not access things," Wiseman says, adding the slow shedding of Laura's layers was particularly appealing.

"When you realise what someone has been through, you suddenly have a greater understanding of why they do what they do."