Feature - Upfront
Ant Timpson
by Matt Nippert
If there’s a film being made, screened or even just talked about in New Zealand, Ant Timpson is probably involved. He founded a festival for “incredibly strange” films, but now programmes the “That’s Incredible!” section for the New Zealand International Film Festival and runs the 48 Hour Film competition. The product of his first foray behind the camera, as executive producer for Matt Heath and Chris Stapp’s bogan stunt comedy The Devil Dared Me To, opens nationwide on October 12.
Before he was cast as a venal lawyer, did you know that Dominic Bowden could act? He practically steals the show. The film is very much a backyard kind of thing, with a lot of friends involved. Michael Galvin’s cameo is very self-effacing, but the weird thing with Bowden is that the DVD of the film got passed around a lot of American studio executives, and he got noticed. We’ve heard feedback like: “That guy’s got good screen presence and some real charisma going on!” I don’t know if he parlayed that – obviously the Idol thing is huge – but he’s on that Phil Keoghan route now.
You’re hoping to export the film, but the main jokes are all at the expense of small-town New Zealand. Will it translate? I’ve seen it with audiences overseas in several different countries, and although they miss the Te Puke gags, they understand the small-town iconography and the dream of going from a small town to a bigger one – jumping from the South Island to the North Island.
I guess it helps that our two main islands have pretty generic names. They probably think that that’s a gag in itself, but unfortunately it’s reality.
Do the international crowds understand the reference to the “Bruno Lawrence Film Studios”? Well, actually, some of them do get that. Bruno’s got a bit more of a name overseas than we realise.
Were you a fan of Heath and Stapp from their Back of the Y days? Yeah, they’re completely creative. But when people see the movie, they have it in their heads it is going to be very similar to the old TV series, very kitchen-sink and cardboard boxes. [Heath and Stapp] have done a pretty extraordinary job for the money they had. People internationally have no idea what the budget was and miss by millions with their guesses. It was done for lunch money.
Your strange film festival got into regular public spats with the Society for the Promotion of Community Standards (SPCS) over alleged obscenity. Were any of these stoushes manufactured for the free publicity? The adage about “You can’t ask for better publicity” was always there, but I never choreographed anything. No emails from “a concerned citizen”, saying: “I heard about this festival, showing this shocking film!”
You never considered joining pornographer Steve Crowe in opposing censorship? Steve contacted me in the early days, saying, “Let’s go get the buggers!” He felt that we were in the same boat, but I wasn’t trying to get Butt Slammers 5 onto screens or anything. That became a real bugbear over the years that the festival was tarnished with that – I was going to say brush, but it was more of a mop.
Of course you did screen some rather racy material. Russ Meyer, for instance, was hardly a prudish director. I’d call him an auteur rather than a pornographer.
The difference being? Pornography is just dicks and pussies, and Meyer was way more campy than that. And now, with the internet, that’s really changed the playing field so much that it seems kind of archaic that anyone would still complain. Why restrict something when you can control it in an R18 environment? You’re just putting up a red flag, saying, “This is the thing that you’ve got to see on YouTube.”
Do you think impending fatherhood – your first child is due next month – will change your view of ratings? Completely. I’ll do a total turnaround. The OC is going to be off TV and I’ll become a spotter for the SPCS. Probably.
