Why can’t we stop watching Find My Country House NZ?
Plus: A groundbreaking new local documentary series, the film that's a frontrunner for the Oscars, and a podcast about the Rainbow Warrior.
Nothing much happens in this property series, but it’s rating through the roof. What does that say about us?
It’s a crisp, cool morning in scenic Central Otago, and house hunters Joni and Luke are standing in a stranger’s garden. The couple are looking for their new dream home – their fourth together – and have travelled the short distance from Queenstown to Lake Hayes to find the perfect property. It’s music to host Matt Gibb’s ears. “I’m on a hunt to find everyday Kiwis their perfect country house,” he announces in the introduction to the new series of Find My Country House New Zealand. Moments later, these “everyday Kiwis” reveal exactly how much money they have to spend on their new home.
Joni and Luke’s budget? Between four and six million dollars.
That’s right, an extremely relatable six million dollar budget. I rewound the episode to double check they weren’t joking, but Joni and Luke didn’t even put their pinky to their lips and say it in a Dr Evil voice. That’s how you know they’re serious.
It’s a bold move for Find My Country House NZ to kick off a new season with a pair of house hunters whose budget is bigger than most people’s dream Lotto win. We may be in the midst of both a cost of living crisis and a housing crisis, but not on Find My Country House NZ. This property series takes city dwellers and shows them homes for sale in the New Zealand countryside, offering them a tantalising glimpse of a more relaxed lifestyle filled with serenity, solitude and enough space to realise how far away they are from the nearest A&E department.
Last year the series – then known as Country House Hunters NZ – hit the headlines for showing one couple through a house they already owned. It didn’t let that delicious scandal keep it down, and returned to our screens in the new year with a brand new name to fill in the summer holiday TV void left by Seven Sharp.
And we can’t get enough of it. Find My Country House NZ has been a ratings success for TVNZ1, with January figures revealing it was consistently the second most watched broadcast show after 1News. It seems TV viewers have adored watching Joni and Luke mull over how to spend the several million bucks burning a hole in their pockets, or Lana and Warren search for a property in Oxford with room for their chickens, or wonder whether Ted and Roseanne will indeed find their forever home with a bathtub in Ashburton for $800,000.
What’s weird about this is that Find My Country House NZ is one of the least exciting shows on television. It’s a beautiful show filmed in some of our most scenic regions, but nothing happens. Nice people visit nice houses in nice towns, where they say nice things about the views and agree that they could definitely see themselves in that kitchen. Usually they don’t buy any of the houses, and the only drama comes when the show cuts to an ad break right before Gibb reveals the price of each property. Absolute cliffhanger as to whether that European brick home with mountain views in Arrowtown will be in my price range or not, but you know, fingers crossed.
Perhaps we’re watching Country House Hunters because it exists in a world of its own. Rather than reminding us of the grim pressures of daily life, Find Me A Country House NZ offers a brief escape. I spent a perfectly fine 22 minutes watching retired farmer Davy househunt for his sister-in-law Margo, an interior designer who lives in Dubai but wants to buy a home in Wānaka for $2 million. The first house Davy visited was an incredible 1970s wonder that included a bedroom covered in a wallpaper print of topless women. I would have moved there in an instant. (It later sold for $2.85 million, possibly because of all the boobs).
Or maybe it’s the relaxed charm of presenter Matt Gibb. He’s relentlessly upbeat and amiable, and never gets mad when the house hunters don’t buy any of the nice houses he’s spent an entire day showing them. Instead of taking it personally and throwing a garden gnome into a barbecue in disgust, Gibb simply tells the house hunters to keep in touch, and I think he actually means it. He has an impressive collection of winter coats, and I hope this year’s NZ TV Awards recognise the episode where he goes to a Canterbury property decorated with tiny fairy houses and then pretends to film a TV show for fairy house hunters.
Back in Lake Hayes, everyone's having a lovely time. “I’ve thrown the budget out the window!” Gibb announces gleefully as he takes Luke and Joni to their first open home, a four bedroom home with three ensuites, priced at eight million dollars. Sadly, when the couple meet with Gibb again, they decide none of the multi-million dollar properties they’ve seen are right for them. It’s back to Queenstown for these everyday New Zealanders, and off to Alexandra, Selwyn, Matamata and Waihi Beach for Gibb. The search for the perfect country home continues.
Find My Country House NZ screens at 7pm on TVNZ1 and streams on TVNZ+.
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Why you should watch: Queer Aotearoa: We’ve Always Been Here (TVNZ+, February 1)
Local comedian Eli Matthewson hosts Queer Aotearoa: We’ve Always Been Here, an enlightening docuseries about the untold history of Aotearoa’s queer community. Guest-starring local legends such as Mike Puru, the Topp Twins and Anika Moa, the show explores the victories, spaces and stories that fostered and sustained queer culture in Aotearoa. Combining side-splitting humour with powerful personal testimonies and extensive archival footage, Queer Aotearoa: We’ve Always Been Here celebrates the trailblazers who bravely fought for a more inclusive Aotearoa. / Thomas Giblin
You might also like: Queer Aotearoa: We’ve Always Been Here director Harry Wynn reflects on making the groundbreaking series.
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This Spanish language musical comedy crime thriller was the big winner at this year’s Golden Globes, picking up four awards for best supporting actress (Zoe Saldana), best foreign language film, best comedy/musical and best original song. Directed by Jacques Audiard and starring Karla Sofía Gascón and Selena Gomez, Emilia Perez tells the story of a Mexican drug lord who transitions to life as a woman. The film has just earned a whopping 13 Oscar nominations along with months of critical praise, with one review calling it “a powerful, unfiltered portrait of someone who challenges several stereotypes at once”, and another describing it as a gritty crime thriller turned glitzy soap opera that’s “riotously entertaining”.
You might also like: As the Academy Awards approach, we’ve rounded up all this season’s best TV and film award winners and where you can watch them.
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Looking for something good to watch this weekend? Don’t miss this week’s new to streaming list.
Why you should listen to: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior (RNZ)
The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior is the first podcast produced by a content collaboration between RNZ and ABC, Australia's national broadcaster. I listened to it almost all in one go on an evening where my flatmates were out, enjoying the steady momentum through the series. Focusing on where the Rainbow Warrior was before the ship was sunk in Auckland Harbour, I learned heaps about how the people of Rongelap and Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands were affected by American nuclear testing in the Pacific. Host James Nokise and producers travelled to the Marshall Islands and talked with survivors and descendants, and that on-the-ground reporting made this place I'd never visited feel really alive. In its best moments, the extensive research that went into this podcast provides context about the nuclear tests the US were doing, asking important questions like "why did the US not warn the people living in the islands about the tests they were carrying out?"
At times, though, The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior sticks to the formula of a narrative podcast in a way that does the research and voices of the Rongelap people a disservice. Tropes like producers getting Nokise to expel his stream of consciousness into the microphone and "remember, her, from episode two?" and "you know what happened next... but the story that happened first is unbelievable" make a compelling narrative, yet pull the focus away from the actual issue of nuclear testing. I was left wondering: is leveraging a story off something that happened in one of our rich, secure countries the only way to make the New Zealand or Australian public care about issues in the Pacific? / Shanti Mathias
Before we pop off…
TVNZ and Whakaata Māori will have live and free-to-air coverage of Te Matatini o Te Kāhui Maunga 2025. This year, New Zealand’s biggest kapa haka and cultural festival starts on 25 February and will be held in Ngāmotu New Plymouth.
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That’s it for Rec Room for this week. If you liked what you read, why not share Rec Room with your friends and whānau.
In that country house programme they never take their shoes off before they trample through the houses, and never reply in te reo to the presenter's Kia ora. They never buy the houses offered either. All very weird.
That Rainbow Warrior podcast is excellent. Found myself sobbing at the moving description of the final goodbye of the ship. I don't think the impact on the people of the islands has been documented enough and this podcast has made an excellent start.