Nicola Willis announces $577m boost for film

Finance Minister Nicola Willis meets with WingNut films CEO Carlos Ramirez Laloli at Stone Street Studios in Wellington. Photo / Thomas Coughlan

• The Government will top up the screen production grant, a subsidy to the film industry, by $577m this Budget.
• The announcement was made during a tour of Peter Jackson’s studio in Wellington.
• The scheme has brought billions of dollars of film investment to New Zealand.

New Zealand’s film subsidy regime will survive the latest round of budget cuts, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced this morning.

Willis announced she was tipping $577 million into the scheme at the Budget to reflect the higher-than-expected demand on the subsidy. This means the rebate will total $1.09 billion over the four-year forecast period.

Willis announced the investment during a visit to Peter Jackson’s Stone Street Studios on Friday morning as part of a pre-Budget tour.

The studio, in the Wellington suburb of Miramar, was the site of film shoots for The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, King Kong and Avatar.

The Government’s screen production grant – a 20% to 25% rebate on almost every dollar a production spends in New Zealand - is a large line item in most Government budgets.

Finance Minister Nicola Willis annouced she was tipping $577 million into NZ's film subsidy scheme at the Budget. Photo / Thomas Coughlan

The rebate is not “baselined”, meaning it needs to be topped up every Budget or so, or if there is higher-than-expected demand.

“Inbound productions invested nearly $7.5b in New Zealand in the past 10 years, supported by $1.5b in rebate payments,” Willis said.

She said 10 large international productions have come to New Zealand after a 2023 review of the scheme. The films include A Minecraft Movie, the second-highest grossing film of 2025 and Taika Waititi’s Klara and the Sun, based on the book by Kazuo Ishiguro.

Thomas Coughlan is Political Editor and covers politics from Parliament. He has worked for the Herald since 2021 and has worked in the press gallery since 2018.