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'{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2020}} {{Use Australian English|date=February 2012}} {{Infobox film | name = A Maori Maid's Love | image = | caption = | director = [[Raymond Longford]] | writer = Raymond Longford<br>[[Lottie Lyell]] | producer = Raymond Longford<br>Lottie Lyell | starring = Lottie Lyell<br>Raymond Longford | narrator = | cinematography = | editing = Lottie Lyell | music = | studio = Vita Film Corporation<br>The Zealandia Photo Pay Producing Co. | distributor = The Eureka Exchange (Aust) | released = 10 January 1916 (Australia)<br>3 November 1915 (NZ) | runtime = 5,000 feet (five reels)<ref name="papers">"Raymond Longford", ''Cinema Papers'', January 1974 p51</ref> | country = Australia | language = [[Silent film]] <br>English intertitles | budget = }} '''''A Maori Maid's Love''''' (Originally titled '''The Surveyor's Daughter''') is a 1916 Australian [[silent film]]<nowiki/>written and directed by [[Raymond Longford]] about an [[miscegenation|interracial romance]] between a white man and a [[Māori people|Māori]] girl. It is considered a [[lost film]] as there are no known copies.<ref>[http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/AV-Heritage/Missing-Films.html 'New Zealand's Missing Film History' at The Film Archive] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927001906/http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/AV-Heritage/Missing-Films.html |date=27 September 2011 }}</ref> ==Plot== Graham, an unhappily married surveyor, goes on a job to New Zealand where he falls in love with a Maori woman. She becomes pregnant and dies in childbirth. Graham puts his daughter in the care of Maori Jack, who later kills Graham. However his daughter ([[Lottie Lyell]]) inherits his property and falls in love with a jackeroo called Jim.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article121332016 |title=A FAIR MAID'S LOVE. |newspaper=[[The Sunday Times (Sydney)|The Sunday Times]] |location=Sydney |date=9 January 1916 |accessdate=1 September 2013 |page=16 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> ==Cast== *[[Lottie Lyell]] *[[Raymond Longford]] *Kenneth Carlisle *[[Rawdon Blandford]] ==Production== The film was shot on location in [[Rotorua]] and [[Auckland]] from August 1915, with finance from a Sydney company, Vita Film Corporation. It was the first of two films Longford and Lyell made in New Zealand, the other being ''[[The Mutiny of the Bounty]]'' (1916).<ref>Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper, ''Australian Film 1900–1977: A Guide to Feature Film Production'', Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1998, 57</ref> ==Release== ===Distribution difficulties=== Longford was unable to secure a release for the film in New Zealand. He blamed this on the influence of "the Combine" of [[Australasian Films]] and Union Theatres, who dominated distribution and exhibition at the time.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16376940 |title=FILM INDUSTRY. |newspaper=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]] |date=17 June 1927 |accessdate=7 January 2012 |page=12 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> The film was given a limited release in Sydney at a cinema owned by Hubert and Caroline Pugliese.<ref>[http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/pugliese-caroline-frances-13160 Crowley, Bill, 'Pugliese, Caroline Frances (1865–1940)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, accessed 7 January 2012.]</ref> ===Critical reception=== The critic from the ''Sydney Sun'' called it "unquestionably the best moving picture produced up to date at this end of the world... there would be little need for importing films while Australia can make her own of such a standard."<ref>[http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=AG19160205.2.18&cl=search&srpos=2&e=-------10--1----0%22a+maori+maid%27s+love%22--&st=1 LOCAL AND GENERAL]. ''Ashburton Guardian'', Volume XXXV, Issue 8366, 5 February 1916, Page 4, accessed 11 September 2013</ref> The ''Motion Picture News'' said the film "certainly could not be classed as a masterpiece. Reduced to three reels it would make a good, pleasing feature. The subtitles in their present state are crude and need revision. Director Raymond Longford had a hard task when he posed the Maori maids before the camera and deserves credit for the results obtained."<ref>[https://archive.org/stream/motionpicturenew132unse#page/1446/mode/2up/search/australia "Film News from Foreign Parts", ''Motion Picture News'' 11 March 1916] accessed 23 November 1916</ref> Lottie Lyell edited the film for its British release.<ref>[http://teaching.austlit.edu.au/?q=node/110768 Lottie Lyell] at [[AustLit]]</ref> ==Significance== The movie is generally agreed to be the first full-length New Zealand feature film.<ref>Helen Martin and Sam Edwards, ''New Zealand Film: 1912–1996'', Oxford Uni Press, 1997 p 25</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article83700337 |title=AUSTRALIAN FILMS. |newspaper=[[Daily News (Perth, Western Australia)|The Daily News]] |location=Perth |date=18 December 1931 |accessdate=11 September 2013 |page=11 Edition: HOME (FINAL) EDITION |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> ==References== {{reflist}} ==External links== *{{IMDb title|id=0007035|title=A Maori Maid's Love}} {{Raymond Longford}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Maori Maid's Love}} [[Category:1910s New Zealand films]] [[Category:1916 films]] [[Category:Australian drama films]] [[Category:New Zealand drama films]] [[Category:Australian silent feature films]] [[Category:Australian black-and-white films]] [[Category:Films about interracial romance]] [[Category:Films directed by Raymond Longford]] [[Category:Films set in New Zealand]] [[Category:Films shot in New Zealand]] [[Category:Lost Australian films]] [[Category:1916 drama films]] [[Category:Lost New Zealand films]] [[Category:1916 lost films]] [[Category:Lost drama films]] [[Category:Films about Māori people]] [[Category:Silent drama films]] [[Category:1910s Australian films]]'