"hilarious and lurid... poignant... intimate"
Anthony Hubbard, Sunday Star Times
Click here for full text

"gripping... highly entertaining... belly laughs"
Jane Bowron, The Dominion
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"refreshingly honest... the tension, tears and swearing say it all...
the timing could not have been better"
Deborah Morris, Evening Post

"riveting stuff... absolutely fascinating... a classic of its kind...
will remain a treasure in our collective archive"
Professor Margaret Clark, Victoria University of Wellington
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Shot during New Zealand's first national election run under the new "MMP" system, Campaign takes you into the trenches with the candidates as they battle for the very marginal Wellington Central seat. Its a fun film that raises some serious questions about the human face of power politics.

JOIN the Campaign Supporters mailing list If you've got any time, skills, talents, contacts or ideas that you might be able to contribute to making "Campaign" a bigger success than it already has been PLEASE join our discussion mailing list... just type your email address below and click "Join List". View List Archive

WATCH the 90 second movie trailer!
Optimized to stream at 56K. There's also 28K and dual ISDN versions (all RealMedia G2 format).

SEE a 1996 TV3 News story about "Campaign"
Optimized to stream at 56K (RealMedia format).

READ my correspondence with Phil Saxby of the Electoral Reform Coalition
Did Wellington Central '96 represent a failure for MMP?

GET the Campaign "Help Wanted" poster
Perfect for a noticeboard near you!

INSTALL the groovy Campaign desktop wallpaper for Windows
Email it to your friends! Simply download and run this self-extracting file, specifying your Windows directory.
Then set it as your wallpaper in Control Panel|Display Properties|Background. Available 800x600 or 1024x768.

I chose Wellington Central because I knew the contest there would be close and interesting. What I never anticipated was how fast-moving national events would make it absolutely critical to the national election result, exposing unexpected quirks in the MMP electoral system and, most overwhelmingly, producing a riveting human story with strong elements of drama, comedy and personal tragedy. Its a great yarn with an important message, and I'm really excited to be able to tell it.

Against the odds, Campaign has gotten this far without any institutional funding or other assistance whatsoever. So far New Zealand's broadcasters have also declined to support it (for a discussion on the issues surrounding this see the opinion section of this website). We've managed to get this far only with the voluntary support of a number of New Zealand film makers and craftspeople, including Gaylene Preston (creative consultant), Russell Baxter (technical consultant), Paul Sutorius, Heather Small and Andy Mortimer (all editors) and John Clarke [aka Fred Dagg, all stand] (trailer music). This is their film too, and it would never have been made without them. Thanks, guys!

Tony Sutorius
Director & Producer
Campaign