kiwipete

Peter Jackson from New Zealand - the world's highest paid director for King Kong.The Guiness world record for the biggest paid fee paid to a director. That's a lot of money for some great writing.It was also the biggest film budget too - US$207 million for King Kong.

If Peter Jackson doesn't like what studios offer him, which includes 20th Century Fox and Universal Pictures profit share offer for the yet unmade HALO - he backs off and looks elsewhere.He can afford to - THE LORD OF THE RINGS made US$2.7 billion at the box office alone -with 20 Oscars from his films he can do what he likes.There are more movies, a partnership with Microsoft for new kinds of video games, and even ideas for a television mini- series.

Don't get the idea that Peter Jackson is some sort of big- head - he isn't! He's lost a lot of weight and has replaced those horn rim glasses with contact lenses, but at heart he is still that big overweight young man who started his professional life making a low budget gory comic zombie movie BAD TASTE, on weekends around the Wellington region for three years or so.

He was self- taught and was involved in just about everything in that film - the $10,000 cost coming from his weekly wage as an engraver for the local paper.Twenty years ago this very month, the New Zealand Film Commission finally relented and agreed to financially back an unknown young film maker from Pukerua Bay just a few miles outside of Wellington City.

He said he used to save up and buy four or five rolls of film, shoot them all up in a day, store them in the fridge until his next pay cheque and get them processed.When he had to pay the lab bill he couldn't afford film until the following week.

He was living at home with his parents at the time, and when he got his first $5,000 from the film commission he resigned his job as an engraver the very next day.

Today Peter doesn't have to store film in his fridges in his homes, offices or jet. He can afford as many rolls of film he wants, whenever he wants, in a jiffy,and get the film processed in a multi- million dollar facility that he owns in Wellington. He no longer has to go cap in hand to anybody to get money for his films. Now the world's biggest studios come to him! He is Mr Peter Jackson, and the world is his oyster!

Methamphetamine drug abuse in the Asia-Pacific region is among the highest levels in the world, with Australia up among the top eight countries who have named it as their most abused drug.

Experts were given some real education to the extent of the methamphetamine drug use at the inaugural Australasian Amphetamine conference in Sydney, Australia, recently.

Launching the 2005 United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime regional report on amphetamine-type stimulant (ATS)abuse, the regional director,Jeremy Douglas, reportedly said Australia was at the world's amphetamine core.

Robert Ali, who introduced the latest report from the Australian National Council on Drugs, said the size of the problem was daunting!

It is not only the socially disaffected who use the drug, but also the middle class of developing countries who are aspiring to greater wealth and prosperity, to the lifestyles and customs of developed countries.

When China can manufacture ecstacy tablets for eight cents each, and are producing them in quantities way beyond demand consumption, the drugs are moving like wildfire throughout the region. The drugs are sold in New Zealand, for instance, at up to NZ$100 each. That gives you some idea as to the profits that can be made in this drug trade.

There are, reportedly, 25 million people worldwide who use ATS, and eight of thirteen countries in the East Asia/Pacific region, including Australia and New Zealand, who nominate it as their most abused drug.

In the Philipines, 23% of the population reported a lifetime abuse of drugs, and eleven labs were uncovered in the past year. Last year 15.8 million amphetamine tabs were seized in Thailand, 4.7 million in Laos and 2.7 million in Myanmur(Burma).

A New York drugs expert pointed to the successes of the methadone programme in tackling the heroin abuse over a number of decades, and called for a similar "harm minimisation" approach to replace the zero tolerance attitudes to drugs.Methadone has been given to heroin addicts to wean them off the heroin drug.

An Australian parliamentary health secretary, reportedly,said the government was open to exploring substitution drugs, but would not relax its zero tolerance stance.I believe that would be the opinion of the New Zealand Government as well.

The increase in what is called "P" or methamphetamine use in serious assaults and muurders in New Zealand in recent years has alarmed both the public and the government.The rest of the western world should be concerned as well!

The Red Baron finally returns home - modern Germany reclaims its war hero!

Germany is about to break, what has been described as a 41 year taboo, by celebrating the life of one of its greatest war heroes - Manfred Von Richthofen aka "The Red Baron".

A film depicting the daring exploits of Von Richthofen who shot down 80 allied pilots during the First World War,will be released in German cinemas next year.

It should create a furore; since 1945 German soldiers, airmen and sailors have been portrayed as heel-clicking fanatics, underground freedom fighters or reluctant victims of the Nazi regime.

There have been a number of films made that did not show the German military in good light.

The Red Baron has been a cult figure overseas for decades, including a Peanuts comic- strip which portrays imaginery battles between Snoopy and the Red Baron - there are also Red Baron computer games, and even pizzas.

But now German society has evolved from its era of shame and has decided to embrace its heroes from the past - and reclaim their First World War flying ace and turn him into a truly modern hero - and the world will share and celebrate him with this new Germany.

As German troops have been drawn into potential combat missions - senior officers are looking for new regimental role models, untarnished by Nazi history.

In the film, the Red Baron will be played by a young German actor, Matthias Schweighofer, who presents him as a 21st Century icon: first as a young happy go-lucky pilot eager to get into the air - then as a swaggering figure bloated by success - and finally as a person manipulated by the Imperial German propaganda machine.

A brief background of Manfred Von Richthofen:

He was the son of a Prussian nobleman, who trained first as a cavalry officer at a time when mounted troops were becoming obsolete.He made the move to flying aircraft and actually crashed in his first solo flight after 25 training hours.He flew a Fokker triplane and after twenty five air victories ensured legendary status by being awarded the Pour Le Merite (The Blue Max) and became The Ace of Aces with his 80 victories over allied pilots.

The demise of the Red Baron:

The first person to claim victory for downing and killing him was a Canadian pilot,Roy Brown,after a dogfight. But historians believe he was actually killed by ground fire from an Australian soldier.

On April 21, 1918,Manfred Von Richthofen followed a British Sopwith Camel, flown by Wilfred May into British territory further than he had done previously.Perhaps he sensed that this might be one of his last hunts - the once invincible German squadrons were now inferior to the new faster and more agile British aircraft.

He was killed by a single bullet from behind, passing diagonally through his chest.He was killed instantly, and his aircraft ploughed into a field alongside the Corbie to Bray road. His body was recovered by British soldiers and buried with full military honours.

Manfred Von Richthofen was just 25 years old.He wasn't necessarily the greatest of pilots,but was an extremely accurate shot.

In acknowledging the British role of cherishing him as a hero, his great-nephew was appointed as German Ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1989-93.

Now Germany can acknowledge and celebrate him as their own hero and icon. The Red Baron has flown home for the final time. Rest in peace!

The recent death of Australian icon, crododile hunter, Steve Irwin, is a repetition of that of an 18 year old New Zealand woman in 1939.

The records of a young New Zealand woman who was stabbed through the heart by a stingray barb have recently been discovered since the death of Australian icon, crocodile hunter, Steve Irwin.

An entry in the 1939 Medical Journal stated that the death of an 18 year old woman was "an unusual bathing fatality", and that she had collapsed while bathing in three feet of water in the Hauraki Gulf (Auckland).

An autopsy report found the cause of death was haemorrhage from a wound to the heart caused by a Stingray barb.

The article said the victim's body was found alone on the beach and police would no doubt have suspected a "murder of the sexual pervert character" as the wounds looked like those made by the sharpest of knives.

Sir Walter Hadlee a former captain of New Zealand cricket's test team before and after World War 2, and the "49 ers" arguably the best NZ side to tour England during a period when England dominated the game: they managed four draws from four tests; he was also a manager,chairman of selectors and a national administrator during his long sporting career.

Sir Walter was the patriarch of the Hadlee cricketing dynasty and had been in Princess Margaret Hospital in Christchurch, New Zealand.Three of his sons were also New Zealand test players, Sir Richard,Dayle and Barry.Richard as he was known as a player, was New Zealand's best ever player: the first bowler to take 400 test wickets and a world ranked all- rounder.

Down in Christchurch's Lancaster Park, where the present day Jade Stadium is situated, and where the Crusaders,Canterbury and All Blacks rugby teams play,is the "Hadlee Stand" - undoubtably recognizing the deeds of the two famous cricketing knights.

I doubt very much if there will ever be a sporting dynasty such as the incredible Hadlees. New Zealand has never ranked as a cricketing nation, but whenever Sir Walter's son, Sir Richard had a cricket ball in hand, or bat in hand as a middle-order batsman, New Zealand were always in with a chance, as they were sixty years ago when a willowy opening batsman named Walter Hadlee faced the best of England.

Goodbye Sir Walter, New Zealand and world sport salutes a champion; New Zealand loses a sporting legend, and Sir Richard Hadlee loses his famous father!

The Exclusive Brethren - a church or a dangerous and hypocritical sect with a secret agenda?

Who do these people represent their people, their God or some other entity?

I have been reading about the Exclusive Brethren a fundamentalist Christian sect, who are causing some problems in the upcoming Victorian State Elections in Australia.

They actually caused a furore with their involvement in the New Zealand parliamentary elections last year - spending NZ$1.2 million dollars in propaganda publicity. I call it propaganda because the pamphlets they created and distributed were over the top personality attacks against the governing Labour Party and the Greens.

These were actually hypocritical attacks from a so-called Christian organisation whose members do not vote, watch television,listen to the radio,use computers or socialise with people outside of their membership. They have some strange ideas about which I won't elaborate here.

The leader of the New Zealand Opposition National Party, Dr Don Brash( a subject himself of one of my recent posts )has publicly denounced the Exclusive Brethren because of their tactics in last years elections, and stated that his party doesn't want any future contacts with that fundamentalist sect.A bit late considering he had actually met with them at least twice since our elections, and denied it!

I'd be interested hearing from any of our Aussie friends who may have some news in relation to the coming state elections in Victoria.