Rudall Hayward

Legendary filmmaker Rudall Hayward, MBE, directed seven features over five decades — decades in which the concept of Kiwi movie-making was still an oxymoron, or meant a foreigner was in charge. Inspired by New Zealand’s crosscultural history, Hayward remade his own Rewi’s Last Stand in 1940. Later he married Rewi star Ramai Te Miha, launching a filmmaking partnership that lasted until Rudall’s death on 29 May 1974.

In New Zealand, it suddenly occurred to me, was material for film plays just as exciting and dramatic and colourful as any Hollywood western. Rudall Hayward in an 8 November 1940 Listener article