The New Zealand Film Commission has taken international sales rights and invested in the post-production of the feel-good drama Second Hand Wedding.

The film was directed by Paul Murphy from a script by Nick Ward (Stickmen, The Ferryman). It is about Jill (Geraldine Brophy), a school teacher who is so obsessed by garage sales and trading second hand goods that her daughter Cheryl does not tell her when she decides to marry for fear her big day will be swamped by pre-loved knick knacks and worse. Ward drew heavily on the habits of his parents.

The film is the first feature for Murphy, a television director and short filmmaker. Murphy is from a New Zealand filmmaking dynasty: he is the son of director/writer Geoff Murphy (Goodbye Pork Pie, The Quiet Earth) and the nephew of the late actor Bruno Lawrence (The Quiet Earth, UTU). The film is also a family affair: the producer is Kerry Robins, whose sisters married Lawrence and Geoff Murphy.

'Paul has been in and around movies for a very long time and is the first of the second generation to make a feature,' said Robins. He joked that they were the New Zealand equivalent of the Barrymore family in the US.

'The film is about family and friends and how the things that can divide us can quite quickly bring us back together again,' said Robins. 'It is heart-warming and female-skewed, and definitely for older audiences.'

Robins also emphasised that the characters were real people and authentic New Zealanders: 'The market responds to these types of films and I believe this one will resonate with a lot of people because it will make them feel good in all the right places.

'Second Hand Wedding is being finished at Peter Jackson's facility, Park Road Post. The low-budget picture was shot on the coast north of Wellington in August with private finance. The NZFC boarded the film after seeing a rough cut.

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