New Zealand International Film Festival

In his latest film Florian Habicht has told a New York love story - his own. Although how much of it is real is up to the audience to decide. Whatever the case, the movie looks set to catapult the eccentric film-maker to new heights, writes Scott Kara.

Acclaimed cinematographer Leo Narbey will speak in Dunedin today as part of the 2011 New Zealand International Film Festival.

Annoyed by the insidious creep of marketing, Morgan Spurlock has made a film about product placement. The twist? It's funded by product placement. Shane Gilchrist reports.

Illustrious Energy might highlight a period in New Zealand history, but the film also has its own interesting back-story, writes Shane Gilchrist.

Nganga Maruge, an 84-year-old man from a small village, made international headlines a few years ago when he decided to take the Kenyan Government up on its offer to provide free primary education to everyone.

The New Zealand International Film Festival starts in Dunedin this week. But Otago Daily Times film critic Mark Orton has been in Auckland where the fun has already started. He passes on some tips to the thrills, laughs and life lessons headed our way.

Thomas Balmes is a French documentary film-maker who has made a few little-seen works of cultural anthropology - the conversion of Papua New Guinea natives to Christianity, Finns seeing how their outsourced cellphones are manufactured in China.

When mainstream cinema seems capable only of giving us frothy fun, either through explosions or wardrobe, the International Film Festival is the time to savour the delights of subtext and ambiguity.

Surprisingly, given the wealth of material about the Doors, the new documentary When You're Strange is the first full-length non-fiction look at the rock band.