Blog Archives

Lawson’s Joins Mile High Club

Lawson’s Joins Mile High Club

Lawson’s Dry Hills Sauvignon Blanc scored the highest overall marks for a white wine in the Scotsman‘s high-altitude taste test. In conjunction with 6 international airlines, the Scotsman and a panel of expert judges sought out…

International Bright Young Thing

International Bright Young Thing

Anna Paquin talks dogs, dorm-living, Degas and “living long distance” with the Independent. Currently studying art history – between films – at Columbia University, Paquin will next be seen alongside Joaquin Phoenix and Ed…

Fast and Furious Springbok Safari

Fast and Furious Springbok Safari

The All Blacks thrashed South Africa 52 – 16 in the Tri-Nations opener in the high velt fortress of Loftus Versfeld. It was South Africa’s worst home defeat with the ABs producing a fine display of…

Third Culturist Boyd nets Nabokov

Third Culturist Boyd nets Nabokov

Brian Boyd-edited Nabokov’s Butterflies, an exploration of Nabokov’s obsession with butterflies that posits Nabokov’s scientific pursuit of lepidoptry as a way of understanding the author more completely, hailed as third  culture exemplar in…

Laga’aia Lionised

Laga’aia Lionised

NZ performers feature strongly in Sydney’s highly anticipated production of The Lion King. Vincent Harde plays the lead role of Simba, with Water Rats star Jay Laga’aia as his on-stage father, Mufasa. The Disney…

Merriman Buries Them

Merriman Buries Them

Australian-based NZer, Stefan Merriman, earned his third motorcycle world title at the World Enduro Championship in Skovda, Sweden. It was his second world title win in the 250cc two-stroke class. Merriman now ranks as Australia’s second most…

Serious as anything

Serious as anything

NZ-born Mambo creative and ex-Mental as Anything guitarist Reg Mombassa turns his satiric talents to serious effect for Isle of Refuge, a show of 13 high-profile Australian artists protesting the treatment of refugees. “I felt…

Leading Lights and Walk-overs

Leading Lights and Walk-overs

NZ wines rate highly in Tim Atkin’s list of ‘summer corkers’ at their peak of drinkability. 2002 Villa Maria Private Bin Sauvignon Blanc: “I’ve never tasted a better vintage of this intense, guava, gooseberry and mango-like South…

Going Global

Going Global

NZ company Airways International is currently overseeing expansion plans for Iran’s Qeshm International Airport. “Strategically located in the Straits of Hormuz, in close proximity to Iran, the Gulf countries and Central Asia, Qeshm Island has a vast…

Cameron Brown: Man of Steel

Cameron Brown: Man of Steel

Three-time NZ Ironman champion, Cameron Brown, has won the Utah Half-Ironman Triathlon, beating Sweden’s Bjorn Andersson by just 6 seconds. Says Brown; “I didn’t think I was going to win it, but I just put my…

Bay Alchemy: Red to Gold

Bay Alchemy: Red to Gold

Sacred Hill Wines earned a gold medal for their Helmsman Cabernet Merlot 2000 at the renowned London International Wine Challenge. Chief winemaker Tony Bish sees the award as proof that “Hawke’s Bay, indeed NZ, continues to produce outstanding…

Cycling Success

Cycling Success

NZ athletes made a strong showing at the track World Cup held in Sydney last month – boding well for the coming world championships. Cycling star Sarah Ulmer won the women’s 3,000m individual pursuit, and the men’s…

Ballet Bebe

Ballet Bebe

NZ ballet export Bebe Eversfield profiled in the Victoria Times. Now 78, Eversfield won a government scholarship to study at London’s prestigious Sadler’s Wells Company (now the Royal Ballet) and made her Albert Hall…

Rats Have Rights Too

Rats Have Rights Too

Native rats (kiore) on Little Barrier Island were saved from a scheduled DOC extermination by local tribe Ngatiwai, who claimed them as taonga. The rats, now almost extinct on mainland NZ, pose a threat to tuatara…

Sweating in the Name of

Sweating in the Name of

Ex-pat Kiwi Richard Stevens likes to do more than his bit for charity. The Belfast resident hopes to raise £2,000 for the Save the Rhinos fund by running both the Belfast and London marathons…

Free GE or GE-free?

Free GE or GE-free?

The GE debate steps up a notch as the government prepares to lift its current moratorium on modified organisms. A commissioned financial projection of the pros and cons of going GE (by Business and Economic Research Ltd)…

Jackson (and NZ) goes ape

Jackson (and NZ) goes ape

Watch out Sky Tower: Peter Jackson is to direct a remake of King Kong for Universal Pictures. The epic production will be filmed on location in NZ and released globally in 2005. Says an…

Captain Kirk

Captain Kirk

Aucklander Kirk Penney is one of the brightest stars on the American college basketball circuit. Penney captains and is the highest point-scorer for the Wisconsin Badgers, a team he has lead into the top 16. A…

Winning-over Delhi bellies

Winning-over Delhi bellies

The Taj Palace Hotel in Delhi held a NZ food festival in honour of The Two Towers‘ Indian release. The event, organised by the NZ Trade Commission, aimed to win the hearts of…

Age No Barrier

Age No Barrier

16-year-old New Zealander Chris Pither came second in the Formula Ford Track Attack at Albert Park, Melbourne. Pither has been racing since the age of seven, and already has three national karts titles to his credit….

#59: 2003 Global Warming

#59: 2003 Global Warming

Edge Message #59 from Brian Sweeney, producer NZEDGE.COM TO NEW ZEALAND EDGE GLOBAL COMMUNITY Welcome to 2003 from the edge. As unsettling winds blow globally, the Aotearoa advantage and geography has never been so prescient….

Scuba-duper

Scuba-duper

NZ waters crop up three times in the Observer‘s list of the world’s best scuba spots. Hauraki Reef and Kaikoura Canyon are recommended for mammal enthusiasts, while a night-dive at Rikoriko Cave (Poor Knights Islands) comes with…

Bright Spark

Bright Spark

Chad Taylor’s Electric continues to receive great press from leading reviewers. Guardian: “The hypnotic pull of Taylor’s story lies in the zigzag dance of its forlorn characters, casting a murky, uneasy sense of doom….

Precious Acclaim: Two Films Tower Over Rest

Precious Acclaim: Two Films Tower Over Rest

“For the first time in a century, Hollywood was beaten in the big budget fantasy stakes. Jackson and his team delivered better special effects and better story-telling in what could be the new millennium’s…

We salute you

We salute you

The Datsuns’ popularity in the U.K shows no signs of diminishing. The boys from Cambridge took out Best Live Band at the New Musical Express annual showcase of rock’s best. Other winners included…

Readable eatables

Readable eatables

Business Day gives Ray McVinnie’s latest cook book a review good enough to eat. The Modern Cook is more than “a series of mouth-watering recipes,” it also builds one recipe upon the next in…

Bottoms Up

Bottoms Up

Deutz Marlborough Cuvee beat Bollinger, Moet & Chandon, and Veuve Cliquot in a blind-tasting by seven British bubbly experts. Which? magazine organised the test, asking local supermarkets and high-end liquor stores to submit the best of their respective…

Paquin: Make mine a double

Paquin: Make mine a double

Anna Paquin joins an ensemble cast including Edward Norton and Philip Seymour Hoffman in Spike Lee’s latest film, The 25th Hour. Advance screenings of the (typically) dark drama have sparked talk of likely Oscar nominations.

Scene-stealing scenery

Scene-stealing scenery

“New Zealanders watching the latest batch of car advertisements on Australian television could be excused for thinking they were back at home.” Rugged and diverse, NZ terrain is the showcase of choice for the…

Magic + Maths = Inspired Teaching

Magic + Maths = Inspired Teaching

Ken Ring has taken his own special brand of mathematics to the UK. The former teacher is now president of the New Zealand Society of Magicians – a career change reflected in his “eccentric approach to…

Bolger on Water

Bolger on Water

In a letter to the Times, ex-PM Jim Bolger cites the role of water in global tensions. Warning against letting War on Terror overshadow basic human needs, Bolger advocates a government-led promotion of water conservation and efficiency:…

The Resurrection

The Resurrection

“If the internet could express emotions, a collective groan of despair would have filtered through a quarter of a million modems with the sudden closure of a site called Arts & Letters Daily.”…

First to Drive Everest

First to Drive Everest

The latest US advertising campaign for the Toyota 4Runner sport utility centres on scaling the rugged heights of Mt Everest. The Saatchi & Saatchi production uses NZ icon Sir Ed Hillary in its bid…

Shared Victory

Shared Victory

Living up to expectations, Georgina and Caroline Evers-Swindell powered to gold at the 2002 World Rowing Championships in Seville, continuing a strong lineage of NZ international rowing achievement. Winning comfortably, the twins knocked more than three seconds…

One to Watch

One to Watch

Special mention is given in Malcolm Gluck’s wine column to the “spectacular” Wither Hills 2002 Sauvignon Blanc: “a beguiling sauvignon blanc of mouthwatering scrumptiousness.” The 2000 vintage was NZ’s most awarded sauvignon ever – could 2002 go…

Lord of the Travel Agents

Lord of the Travel Agents

It is official: NZ is the most popular long-haul destination for Britons. From January to June, a record 228,000 British travelers visited – 8.9% more than in 2001. The Guardian puts the increase down…

Knowledge Society

Knowledge Society

The Guardian survey of international universities commends the NZ government’s ” in higher education and research,” noting “Blairite” Helen Clarke’s role in making “the culture at large more research-friendly.” As a result, student numbers in…

Warriors Minor Premiers

Warriors Minor Premiers

“Kiwis break a few hearts.” The New Zealand Warriors continue an impressive NRL season by finishing top of the table and taking out the minor pemiership (and a $100,000 bonus for the club) – meaning…

“Pastoral Eden”

“Pastoral Eden”

Writer Luba Vangelova takes a road trip up the “stunningly beautiful” east coast of the North Island – a journey described as “temporal as well as geographical.” Vangelova muses over the locals who ” the lost days…

Ashes to Ashes

Ashes to Ashes

The heart-stopping (breaking?) Bledisloe battles are becoming enshrined in Ocker sporting lore: “Once, Australians could rattle off virtually every ball of an Ashes cricket series. Now it is Bledisloe Cup rugby.” According to Spiro Zavos, the battle…

I am international

I am international

“He is the first important painter in that part of the world.” The Netherlands’ Stedelijk Museum is to hold the Western hemisphere’s first major retrospective of Colin McCahon’s work. “What at first sight…

Third time’s a charm

Third time’s a charm

NZ tenor Benjamin Makisi won the prestigious McDonald’s Operatic Aria in Sydney after making the finals three years running. He intends to put his NZ$41,110 prize money towards enrolment in a European opera studio….

NZ Press-ganged In The Australian

NZ Press-ganged In The Australian

Greg Sheridan, using some sobering cliches, gives his views on the trans-Tasman relationship: as well as comparing NZ to Tasmania he invokes ghosts of ANZUS past and our “unreliable” unwillingness to join Australia in Pax-Americana, as reasons…

Celebrations on Ice

Celebrations on Ice

NZ and US scientists in Antarctica recently celebrated the centenary of the first midwinter stopover by British explorers. Fun and games included swimming naked in an ice hole and hurling a (frozen) turkey in Scottish Highland-style games….

Pacific mix

Pacific mix

Jazz has been described as the “original dance music” and one of the genre’s legendary labels, Verve, has dipped into its vaults and commissioned new mixes for contemporary dancefloors. Kiwi Mark de Clive Lowe…

Writer’s block

Writer’s block

“The literary traffic across the Tasman isn’t as brisk as it should be. Much good writing has to come from Auckland or Wellington to Australia by way of publication in London; and New Zealand…

The Empire Strikes Back

The Empire Strikes Back

The SMH finds Tem Morrison carrying the antipodean banner in the new Star Wars blockbuster, Episode II: Attack of the Clones – the latest installment of George Lucas’s epic fantasy: “The best…

Munster Monster of ABs makes Top-10 Sporting Shocks

Munster Monster of ABs makes Top-10 Sporting Shocks

Irish club side Munster’s shut-out 12-0 defeat of the 1978 All Blacks proclaimed by Observer Sport Monthly as the tenth greatest shock in sport’s history. Munster playwright James Breen (Alone It Stands – about the events surrounding…

Best Supporting Landmass

Best Supporting Landmass

Tourists lured by LotR: “Too bad they don’t give Oscars for ‘best supporting landmass’. If they did New Zealand’s role in Lord of the Rings would have swept that award”, reports travel editor Anne…

Wellywood Story

Wellywood Story

LA film producers look to the edge for inspiration in an attempt to reverse the trend of productions increasingly being shot in foreign locations to cut costs: “Los Angeles is not like Wellington”, says…

#51 Local Heroes At Oscars

#51 Local Heroes At Oscars

Edge Message #51 from Brian Sweeney, producer NZEDGE.COM TO NEW ZEALAND EDGE GLOBAL COMMUNITY PUBLISHED TODAY: Kiwi sharpness on show in the world’s online media /category/newzedge/ (72 items and links, see more below) Edgy opinion and affirmation in the NZEDGE…

Edge power play

Edge power play

“Are Tim Bevan (43) and Eric Fellner (41) the most powerful London-based film producers in history? As Working Title (of which they are co-chairmen) is responsible for Bridget Jones’s Diary, Billy…

Paradise Found

Paradise Found

The Southern Alps. The Tongariro volcanoes. The Fiordland rain forest. “There is something archetypal about the scenery here, as though someone copied the planet’s most distinctive landscapes and jammed them all on two islands….New Zealand is the…

Speaking in tongues

Speaking in tongues

Applauded young Aotearoa actress Madeleine Sami, dodges questions about her involvement with Rings star Elijah Woods (“we kind of hung out and went to the movies a bit”), a day after Woods confesses he’s…

Love Trolley Champ

Love Trolley Champ

Competing on an indoor erg (affectionately known as the ‘love trolley) Georgina Evers-Swindell wins the Crash-B World Indoor Rowing Championship with a time 0.6 sec off her world record. The win caps off a huge year…

Man with the Hook

Man with the Hook

NZ-born Sam Chisholm, the man who spent more time in the boxing ring than class room at King’s College, who then went on to become deal maker and right hand man for both Kerry Packer and Rupert…