Catching the Tide - Sam Hunt's Cook Strait

Film (Full Length) – 1988

Poet Sam Hunt goes "between islands" on a home turf tour in this 1988 documentary. To a backdrop of languid 'good day' Strait's scenery, he yarns with locals about stories of land and sea, and recites poetry: "[it's all about just] standing back and listening ... or watching". He chats with poet Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, goes groper fishing off Mana, and hears of a plan to float on a flax flutterboard across the Strait. Hunt then gets himself across via ferry for whaling stories at Oxley's Rock pub and meets boatbuilders and Cape Jackson farmers. Costa Botes' film includes (brutal) archival whaling footage.

There were others here before me. Some people who still work Cook Strait, or if they're smart, make Cook Strait work for them. This film is about a few of those people. Some people — who like me — chose to live here, and some people who were chosen by it. And still some, who never made it in back home ...
– Sam Hunt