Valley of the Stereos

1992 New Zealand film

1992 (1992)

Running time

15 minutesCountryNew ZealandLanguageEnglish

Valley of the Stereos is a 1992 New Zealand short film written by Costa Botes and George Port and produced by Jim Booth and Peter Jackson.^[1]^[2]

Plot

An escalating battle takes place between River, a hippie and a metalhead who live next door to each other in the countryside. Following the metalhead's late-night music playing, the two battle over who can drive the other away with their incompatible music tastes. Each accumulates a larger and larger pile of stereos, until eventually River converts his house into a multi-stereo mecha and accidentally blasts both homes out of existence.

Cast

Danny Mulheron as River
Murray Keane, metalhead

Reception

The film was described as "comic face-off that starts tinny, but gleefully escalates to bass heavy, as a not-so-zen hippy (Danny Mulheron) gets caught up in a vale-blasting battle with the noisy bogan next door (Murray Keane). Made by many key Peter Jackson collaborators, the near-wordless pump up the volume tale was directed by George Port, shortly before he became founding member of Jackson's famed effects-house Weta Digital. Ironically Weta's computer-generated miracles would help render the stop motion imagery seen in the finale largely a thing of the past."^[3]

Accolades

The film received various awards.^[4]

References

^ Leotta, Alfio (17 December 2015). Peter Jackson. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-1-62356-948-8.
^ Goldsmith, Ben; Ryan, Mark David; Lealand, Geoff (1 April 2015). Directory of World Cinema: Australia and New Zealand 2. Intellect Books. ISBN 978-1-78320-481-6.
^ Screen, NZ On. "Valley of the Stereos | Short Film | NZ On Screen". www.nzonscreen.com. Retrieved 25 January 2024.
^ "Valley of the Stereos". New Zealand Film Commission. Retrieved 25 January 2024.