New Zealand filmmaker Zia Mandviwalla has only ever made short films, which is why her name isn’t well-known. Her talent as a storyteller, however, is undeniable.
Show Me Shorts recently profiled the director’s work, detailing three of her four shorts that examine the ways in which cultures collide – especially in New Zealand. Her latest film, 2012’s Night Shift, gained an amiable amount of film festival attention including award nominations at both Cannes and Sundance. Check out the full piece here.
(And if you’ve got a short film, submissions for Show Me Shorts 2018 is now open.)
The only film the article doesn’t cover is Mandviwalla’s 2007 short Clean Linen.
Written by Shuchi Kothari (who went on to co-write Apron Strings), the 15 minute film centres on a young Kiwi-Indian brother and sister who secretly watch their father’s “naughty” tapes. As kids would, they treat it more as a curiosity – a dirty window to the secret life of adults.
Mandviwalla never shows the TV screen (but boy do you hear it) because she’s not interested in the fake world of Western television or the even faker world of pornography. Childhood is the focus here, perfectly contrasted by the sternness of their overworked mother and the apathy of their exhausted father.
Weirdly, the saddest scene in the whole film sees the dad explain to his son the importance of the Windsor Knot, which is quite possibly the least important thing in the world. And that’s the point. This moment succinctly captures the façade that is Being Adult – especially if you’re a foreigner trying to adapt to a country that may not completely favour you.
Though the camera often gazes at the sunny outdoors, it stays confined in the house – much like the children. The film treasures their innocence like a small bird; something that’s better to see in the open than caged inside. There is no façade to being a child, and just like clean linen, that youth is a purity destined to become grubby in the messy world of adulthood.
