Feature NZ 2010 prod co T.H.E. Film Ltd prod Trevor Haysom dir Simone Horrocks DP Jac Fitzgerald screenplay Simone Horrocks. Based on the novel The Paraffin Child by Stephen Blanchard (1999) ed Cushla Dillon Music Joel Haines cast Antony Starr, Peter McCauley, Sally Stockwell, Cohen Holloway, Georgia Rose Wightman, Maria Walker, Vicky Haughton, Brenda Kendall, Paul Gittins, Kip Chapman, Michelle Langston, Cherie James, Elizabeth Hawthorne.

94 mins

Reviewed by Helen Martin

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Having had considerable success as a writer/director of short films, including the award-winning Spindrift, it’s not surprising that Simone Horrocks’ debut feature is a stunner. Intense, brave and affecting, After the Waterfall is a film that stays in the mind.

Shot in West Auckland (the Waitakere Ranges, Piha, New Lynn, Henderson), it feels so rooted in these places there’s no hint that the story from which it was adapted was originally set in Hull, England. From the endless Piha bush to the gorgeous Kitekite (or Ketekete) Falls to the shabby New Lynn shops and taxi rank, this is Aotearoa through and through, with the settings absorbed into the dramatic texture of the film not as scenic spectacle (Lion Rock is barely glimpsed), but as real places where people live and work. Locations aside, the story itself – of a missing child and a traumatised family and community – is chillingly universal and, at times, very hard to watch.

The narrative follows the emotional journey of a Piha forest ranger, John (Antony Starr), whose delightful and much-loved four-year-old daughter Pearl (Georgia Rose Wightman) mysteriously disappears while in his care. One minute she’s there, playing happily with her bubble pipe, the next she’s gone, vanished without a trace. The unraveling of a marriage, a close friendship and a life that has meaning follow as John, unable to articulate his deep guilt and grief, unable to find closure, becomes disconnected and, eventually, lost.

Thankfully, while his journey is devastating and cruel, this is a story of healing and redemption, brought about finally not by any external agency, although John’s father (Peter McCauley) is something of a lifeline, but by John himself. It’s no Hollywood ending; rather, there’s an authenticity to the emotional resolution that’s ultimately very satisfying.

There’s a European feel to the narrative that is just right for this film. The shooting style is tight and concentrated, the camera and musical score acting as quiet observers as the story carefully unfolds. The drama is captured in small, telling moments, not one of which is wasted. A lot is asked of the actors in After the Waterfall and they all more than deliver, particularly Antony Starr, whose bravura performance is the riveting focal point.

After the Waterfall screens at the Wellington International Film Festival on 30 and 31 July – click here for more info.

The film will receive a national theatrical release in the fourth quarter of this year.

Further reading:
• Simone Horrocks interviewed on Kiwi FM
• Simone Horrocks interviewed on TVNZ
• Antony Starr interviewed on Good Morning, TVNZ
• Film's Facebook page