Renowned filmmaker: Turning failure into success
Among the University of Canterbury honorary autumn graduates was internationally acclaimed filmmaker Dame Gaylene Preston. Metropol editor Lynda Papesch looks into the story behind the university’s new Doctor of Letters.
Gaining a degree at age 77 adds another episode to Dame Gaylene’s successes, although it is not her final chapter. She’s already under way with her next film project.
The honorary doctorate, also known as a Doctor of Literature degree, is awarded to candidates whose record of published work and research shows ability and originality and constitutes a distinguished and sustained achievement. Dame Gaylene’s marks an “extraordinary contribution to New Zealand’s creative landscape”, the university says.
Christchurch has long been an integral part of her life, from younger days visiting cousins here while growing up in Greymouth, to attending the Ilam School of Fine Arts at Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha University of Canterbury.
Three years into her studies in painting at Ilam, fate intervened, leading her down a different path. She didn’t pass several of her end-of-year exams, so left without finishing her degree.
“All I had were Fs, F for fail,” she laughs. “To make matters worse, in those days the results were published in all the newspapers.”
By then the Preston family was living in Napier, so home she went. “It was 1968 and there I was, 22 years old and back in my hometown. Fortunately, no one in my family had been to university and they were more concerned about me getting married and having children. Now, here I am, at 77, and I’ve finally succeeded in gaining a degree. It’s such an unexpected honour,” she laughs.
Successes and setbacks
Carving an internationally-renowned career as an innovative writer, director, and producer, her films include Mr Wrong, Ruby and Rata, War Stories Our Mothers Never Told Us, Bread & Roses, Perfect Strangers, Home By Christmas, Hope and Wire, and My Year with Helen.
Most of her works have screened at key international film festivals, including Venice, Sundance, Toronto, Cannes Cinéma Des Antipodes, and extensively in Australia and New Zealand.
Her career has been marked by a series of successes and setbacks. After quitting her studies, she took a job as an assistant at a psychiatric day hospital in Christchurch. Inadvertently, that was where she “discovered the healing nature of art”. “This led to filmmaking which, as it turns out, I’m better at than painting.”
On a psychological level, Dame Gaylene believes the career path she followed brought with it an understanding of the importance of having a purpose rather than a dream.
“When I was young, I dreamed of being a world-class painter, however dreams require you to achieve all these milestones along the way. What happens if you miss those milestones?
“The thing about a purpose is that it’s in the now. Life is for living now. If you don’t know what your purpose is, go and help someone else with their kaupapa for a while.”
What comes next?
Dame Gaylene constantly nurtures her strong belief that the basic responsibility of New Zealand filmmakers is to make films principally for the New Zealand audience. “If we don’t, no one else will,” she says. An innovative writer, director, and producer, she has proven time and again that it is possible to live in Aotearoa and contribute New Zealand stories to global cinema. Her executive producer credits include award-winning films, such as Annie Goldson’s Punitive Damage, Brita McVeigh’s Coffee, Tea or Me?, Michelle Savill’s Ellen is Leaving, Anna Marbrook’s LOIMATA, and Paora Joseph’s Tātarakihi – The Children of Parihaka.
Known for powerful mentorship, and advocacy skills central to the development of New Zealand’s contemporary filmmaking community, in 2001 Dame Gaylene was the first filmmaker to receive an Arts Foundation Laureate Award. In 2002 she became an Officer of the NZ Order of Merit for services to the film industry, and eight years later received the inaugural lifetime achievement award for outstanding contribution to documentary. The list goes on, and show no signs of ceasing.
Kiwi audiences are now eagerly awaiting her latest film GRACE: A Prayer For Peace, made in collaboration with the visual artist Dame Robin White. It’s hard to believe Dame Gaylene ever failed, given such a stellar international career.
