For the past few days, Kristel and I have been doing a tour of the most run down houses in Gisborne, looking for locations for the gangster’s houses. We had help from many of the real estate agents, but understandably, many of the owners did not want their properties linked with references to gangsters, even in a fictional scenario.

Wiz again came to rescue with his seemingly inexhaustible local contacts with a perfect house for Aroha’s family home and friendly owners who were happy to have their house immortalized on film!



The top illustration shows one of the derelict houses we looked at on our location recce and the lower illustration the house that Wiz found for us which was used as Aroha’s childhood home. In this photograph we are shooting a scene on the verandah where the women of the whānau plot the arranged marriage of Aroha and Hunapo. This scene was eventually cut from the finished film.