Wairarapa comedy terrorism
Police were called to Kieran Charnock’s mum’s Masterton sleepout after a woman was heard screaming.
Charnock had forgotten to tell neighbours he was making an $8,000 feature film about terrorists in the most unlikely and lowbudget of settings.
For best friends Charnock and Jonathan Watt, waiting around in the hope of gaining funding from the New Zealand Film Commission didn’t appeal - so they funded their film Black Shark themselves.
Black Shark follows a group of loners who try to be activists and accidently become terrorists, led by Rene Le Bas’ Alex Feiffer, a cynical university student dismayed by the way the world works. Things get dire when the group links up with a much more serious Russian terrorist organisation who demand Black Shark kidnap the son of the Minister of Defence.
Then they spend the duration of the film trying to escape the Russian terrorist group.
Charnock says his film is dark, awkward and very Kiwi. ‘‘It’s quirky, I want to make sure people know that it’s not even really a typical comedy,’’ he says.
A part-time chef at Wellington’s Rahzoo Cafe, Charnock is an aspiring actor while Watt is a student and part-time production runner for Weta Digital. Together, Charnock describes them as struggling, desperate, idiotic filmmakers. Without any insurance, the cast of eight spent eight out of the 10 days of filming in Masterton and in Charnock’s mother’s sleepout - the hub of the terrorist activity. The other two days were filmed in Wellington.
‘‘We just wanted to go back to the reason why we like making films - because we like making films,’’ Charnock says.
He and Watt hope to show a couple of screenings of Black Shark in February with even bigger dreams of having the film feature in the next NZ Film Festival.
The pair have been making films since they were 12 years old, with Masterton as their backyard.
They’ve taken part in the odd 48 Hour Film Festival, but prefer to do things at their own pace and in their own way.
‘‘We’ve always done our own thing, we make a lot of short films,’’ Charnock says.
‘‘It’s not really about terrorism. All the films we have made before, and all the scripts we’ve made, have been about outsiders.’’