Bellbird ★★★

SAM Neill must have been too expensive, unavailable or both.

The main character in the New Zealand film Bellbird is ready-made for the go-to man for Kiwi film-makers.

But dairy farmer Ross is played by Marshall Napier, a character actor who has played almost every type of role imaginable since the late 1970s.

Napier is one of those actors whose name may be unfamiliar but you will absolutely know his face.

In writer/director Hamish Bennett’s first feature, Napier is exceptionally good as Ross who is forced to battle personal and financial battles in order to keep his small enterprise going so it can eventually be handed down to his adult son Bruce (Cohen Holloway).

Ross is your typical farmer of a certain age, stoic, short of words with a strong work ethic and morals and a perplexed view of the modern world.

His world comes crashing down with a couple of events near the start of the film, leaving him struggling to pay the bills and connect with Bruce who hasn’t yet found his way in the world and isn’t sure whether he wants the life that Ross is determined to provide.

Along the way we meet a collection of typically eccentric Kiwi characters who live to the beat of their own hearts and seek out the humour and optimism in every challenge.

It’s a nice, quiet film, unspectacular in many ways, but authentic in its depiction of rural life, grief and the need to carry on despite the setbacks that life throws at you.