Movie treat for whale fans

A special screening of acclaimed movie The Hunt For Moby Dick will be shown tomorrow evening at the Mayfair Theatre.

Filmed in Britain, New England and the Azores, the movie confronts our perennial fascination with this extraordinary animal, and the book it inspired, Herman Melville's Moby Dick.

The movie follows journalist, author and film maker Philip Hoare as he embarks on a four-year adventure in search of the whale.

Mr Hoare was born and brought up in Southampton, where he still lives and is the author of six non-fiction books.

He has a great passion for marine life and his most recent book, Leviathan or the Whale, was published in September 2008, winning the BBC Samuel Johnson prize for non-fiction last year.

He is currently in Wellington attending the Writers and Readers Week, part of the International Arts Festival, and visited Kaikoura last week. He went out with Encounter Kaikoura and Whale Watch and gave a presentation of his BBC documentaries to sea-based tourism businesses.He is due back in Kaikoura today to begin research on his upcoming film about whales in the South Pacific.

The screening of The Hunt For Moby Dick is sponsored by Whale Watch and Encounter Kaikoura and is a fundraiser for The Huttons Shearwater Charitable Trust. Tickets are $5 per head.

Supper will be provided at half time when people will have the chance to speak to Mr Hoare, as well as Mike Donoghue from the Department of Conservation who will also be attending.

Mr Donoghue is senior international relations officer (marine) with DOC.

He holds an M.Sc. in Oceanography from Southampton University, and is the scientific adviser to New Zealand's commissioner to the International Whaling Commission.

The 72 minute movie starts at 7.30pm with a brief presentation by Mr Hoare and Mr Donoghue.

- © Fairfax NZ News