Alex Casey rewatches the highest-grossing New Zealand film of all time as it celebrates its 10th birthday.
Having only just slaughtered a wild pig with her bare hands mere hours ago, Bella (Rima Te Wiata) sits down at the Casio keyboard, lit by the golden glow of birthday candles. “Ricky Baker, happy birthday,” she croons. “Once rejected, now accepted / by me and Hector, the trifecta.” It’s a sweet moment between the newly-minted family of three, but one made even sweeter when you know the song was entirely improvised by Te Wiata and crew after production realised at the last minute that ‘Happy Birthday’ was still under copyright.
Hunt for the Wilderpeople is full of magical – or “majestical” – moments just like this. Bringing together city kid Ricky Baker (Julian Dennison) and grizzled hunter Uncle Hector (Sam Neill), the adaptation of Barry Crump novel Wild Pork and Watercress follows the unlikely duo’s misadventures as they flee authorities into the unforgiving New Zealand bush. Celebrating its 10th birthday this week, Wilderpeople remains the highest-grossing local film of all time (cultural abundance alert: 2016 also saw the longest-running number one local single of all time in Kings’ ‘Don’t Worry ‘Bout It’).
Rewatching the film a decade on, it’s clear why Wilderpeople still holds that record. There’s Dennison’s star-making turn as the petulant, chatty, Tupac-loving Ricky Baker, the perfect foil for Sam Neill’s gruff man of few words. “Is there anything you want me to do?” Ricky asks. “Yeah, leave me alone,” growls Hector at a Speights ad register. It’s a tricky request once they go bush together, exchanging vital knowledge around the campfire (Hec teaches Ricky about “the knack” and Ricky teaches him about skux – “cool, spunky, brainy, good-looking, gangster”).
But that’s not the only duo worth a mention here. Paula Hall (Rachel House) from child services and Officer Andy Tabbott (Oscar Kightley) are one of the funniest pairings in New Zealand film history. House plays Paula as hellbent and borderline psychopathic in her mission to bring Ricky back into state care. “He’s the spanner in the works, and I am the mechanic who is going to put him back in the toolbox,” she tells the media. Unfortunately, Kightley’s Tabbott is not up to the job. “Something definitely happened,” he says of a crime scene. “But I’m wondering what.”
While these two are responsible for the biggest laughs, including the immortal insult “you’re like Sarah Connor – and in the first movie, before she could do chin-ups,” they also subvert any sense of authority and establishment. On the rewatch I was struck by Ricky’s recollections of state care, including “experiments at the boy’s home” and his friend who died after speaking up. In the wake of the Royal Commission of Inquiry, there’s a breathtaking honesty and darkness in these moments – even more so when you consider they are nestled in a family-friendly comedy.
There’s some other eerily prescient moments that take on a new weight in 2026. When there’s a nationwide media circus around the manhunt for Hector and Ricky, complete with journalists on the scene and Breakfast commentators abuzz, it’s hard not to be reminded of the frenzy and mythology around the Tom Phillips saga. When the pair run into a colander-hat wearing conspiracy theorist known as Psycho Sam (Rhys Darby), obsessed with the “government machine” and “form fillers”, it feels straight from the Covid-19 playbook that was right around the corner.
Of course, the film couldn’t have anticipated any of these unfortunate real world parallels. But what was patently obvious, even back in 2016, was what an impact Hunt for the Wilderpeople would have on the careers of those involved, and the culture that was to follow it. Taika Waititi made his first Thor movie a year later, and went on to make history as the first indigenous filmmaker to win an adapted screenplay Oscar for Jojo Rabbit. It was also Dennison’s ticket to Hollywood, launching him into massive franchises like Deadpool 2 and Godzilla vs Kong.
Closer to home, the ripples of Hunt for the Wilderpeople can still be felt everywhere. Family-friendly cross-country capers such as Bookworm, The Mountain, and Holy Days all have Wilderpeople in their DNA, as do the offbeat comedy horrors like Tom Sainsbury’s bushwalk nightmare Loop Track and even the rural viscera of The Weed Eaters. With anniversary screenings of the film happening around the country this week, it feels like a good time to head back into the bush – plus, Ricky Baker’s birthday song really does deserve to be heard in surround sound.
