New Zealand’s Wilderpeople take place in record books…

Hunt for the Wilderpeople: A national manhunt is ordered for a rebellious kid and his foster uncle who go missing in the wild New Zealand bush.

Based on the book by Barry Crump, also known as (Wild Pork and Watercress), Hunt for the Wilderpeople comes to its record-breaking triumphant final run at the Kiwi box office, Culturedemandsgeeks takes a close inspection.

Back in April 2016 we had the opening of Hunt for the Wilderpeople. The film’s writer and director, Taika Waititi, was flying around New Zealand’s beautifully crafted landscape with its stars Julian Dennison and Sam Neill on the promotional tour.

In an interview, Waititi says he wants his new film to become the highest-grossing kiwi film of all time. The previous title is held by his previous film, Boy, which ran in kiwi cinemas for 26 weeks and grossed $9.3million in 2010.

And Hunt for the Wilderpeople has become a phenomenon just like Boy, overtaking Waitit previous film grossing $12.2million and is still in cinemas today, 37 weeks after its cinematic release and, even though it was released on DVD in September. An incredible feat for the New Zealander and everybody associated with the film.

Photos: Piki Films, Defender Films, Curious Film

Overseas, the film has done extremely well too,grosing $20million in the US, UK and next door with the neighbour, Australia as well.

In the US, the film made about $7.5million over 19 weeks, while in OZ, Wilderpeopled made around  $11.7million, nearly matching its Kiwi gross.

In New Zealand, Wilderpeople held of a host of incredible films, including Finding Dory, Captain America; Civil War, the mighty Jungle Book and a back-catalogue of others.

Also, the film was a critical success. It has a 98 per cent rating on Rotten Tomatoes and was named film of the year by Empire magazine.

For a country with a population of just over 4.5million people, Taika Waititi film has achieved a marvellous step in establishing Kiwi films for the wider, world market.

While Taika Waititi takes over Hollywood with his next two projects: THOR 3: RAGNORAK (2017) and a sequel to his funniest film to date WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS (2014), hysterically entitled WE’RE WOLVES, his latest “little film that could” should put Sam Neil back on the map with a wonderfully gracious performance. And where for the star,  Julian Dennison, the whole world (it seems) will be waiting for him and his next adventure.

From Culturedemandsgeeks, thank you Waititi and everyone associated with the film and New Zealand.