I give New Zealand a lot of grief for being the world’s most far-flung Lord of the Rings gift shop, and for choosing their prime minister via sack race, but one thing New Zealand does do right is to ban parents from giving their kids stupid names. Just think how many future wedgies could be prevented if we kept our kids from being named Pilot, or Jackson with a Y. In New Zealand, Kiwis have to run their names by the government first (which, to be fair, consists of Minister Johno Reed drinking a pint outside the midwifery shed), and sometimes the government says “sorry, try again.” CNN (via CinemaBlend) recently released a list of the names the government wouldn’t allow, compiled below for your viewing pleasure.

(The numbers next to the names refer to how many times the name came up):

Justice:62
King:31
Princess:28
Prince:27
Royal:25
Duke:10
Major:9
Bishop:9
Majesty:7
J:6
Lucifer:6
using brackets around middle names:4
Knight:4
Lady:3
using back slash between names:8
Judge:3
Royale:2
Messiah:2
T:2
I:2
Queen:2
II:2
Sir:2
III:2
Jr:2
E:2
V:2
Justus:2
Master:2
Constable:1
Queen Victoria:1
Regal:1
Emperor:1
Christ:1
Juztice:1
3rd:1
C J :1
G:1
Roman numerals III:1
General:1
Saint:1
Lord:1
. (full stop):1
89:1
Eminence:1
M:1
VI:1
Mafia No Fear:1
2nd:1
Majesti:1
Rogue:1
4real:1
* (star symbol):1
5th:1
S P:1
C:1
Sargent:1
Honour:1
D:1
Minister:1
MJ:1
Chief:1
Mr:1
V8:1
President:1
MC:1
Anal:1
A.J:1
Baron:1
L B:1
H-Q:1
Queen V:1

I admit, I kind of like “President.” Prez for short. I can see it. I’m torn between that and “V8 Anal Mancini” for my firstborn.

For comparison, I’m also including a list of names a mommy blogger in Utah named McKinli Hatch considered for her daughter before eventually settling on “Lakynn.”

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This is the Princess Bride t-shirt that a Qantas flight attendant asked passenger Wynand Mullins to remove on a flight from Sydney to Auckland. That seems like a terrible idea, because in my experience, guys in novelty t-shirts are usually pretty stinky. But apparently the stewardess was less worried about the possibility of Mullins Mandy Pa-stinkin’ (sorry) than about the other passengers, who thought the famous Princess Bride line might be more of a statement of jihad.

Mr Mullins is used to getting questionable looks and received a few while in line waiting to board, but the reaction he received on the plane was “a bit over the top”, he said.
“The flight attendant said to me: ‘Are you able to remove it because some of the passengers are quite intimidated by it’. I thought it was all a bit silly. The person next to me was laughing, because they knew the movie.”
Mr Mullins said he didn’t have another shirt to wear and hoped he would get to wear a pilot’s shirt – but wondered how the other passengers would then react to that.
The flight attendant left in search of another T-shirt but never returned – and didn’t make eye contact with Mr Mullins again. [StuffNZ]

It seems like an extreme reaction, but what you have to remember is that the flight was on its way to New Zealand, where The Princess Bride doesn’t open for another three years. It will no doubt be a massive hit, as Billy Crystal retains Brad Pitt-like popularity there. Some Kiwis are even planning to camp out behind Bill Coogan’s wheat patch for the premiere, just to ensure that they get a tree stump to sit on.

Other evidence that this happened in Australia/New Zealand? The flight attendant was informed of her mistake and everything worked out fine. In America, he’d be in a back room with a car battery hooked to his nipples to keep the airline from having to admit a mistake.

(If the Prime Minister sees his shadow and goes back inside his Hobbit hole, New Zealand has six more weeks of hay rides)

As is pretty much standard practice for movies filming anywhere but LA these days (and hardly anyone shoots movies in LA anymore), the New Zealand government hooked up Warner Bros and the producers of The Hobbit trilogy with some valuable subsidies and tax breaks to keep the production in the country. The $67 million in tax breaks surely bought a production that was a boon to the local economy, employing an army of locals to hot glue mo-cap sensors to the crotch of Andy Serkis’ leotards, in parts of the country where the biggest industry is normally library book late fees. But now, like a lot of us who gave money in exchange for The Hobbit, some Kiwis, including prominent politicians, want their money back.

“Now the first movie has grossed more than $1 billion, Warner Brothers should repay the $67 million subsidy the movie moguls sucked from Kiwi taxpayers,” [leader of the NZ First political party Winston Peters] said. [StuffNZ]

Specifically at issue was Prime Minister John Keys’ claim, when pushing the subsidies, that the production would create “3,000 jobs.” Peters has since uncovered correspondence between Keys and Peter Jackson’s production company that he says proves that the number was plucked out of the air. The emails are his “smoking plum,” in New Zealand parlance, where the secret to gunpowder has not yet been discovered.

“The Government claims that filming The Hobbit in New Zealand created an extra 3000 jobs and this was value for money to taxpayers, but documents from John Key’s office show this figure was plucked out of thin air. “Questions have to be answered about how many of these jobs existed prior to filming, how many of them will exist once the final film has premiered, and how many of these jobs actually went to New Zealanders.”

Aw, it’ll take a little advertising, but once the people in Hollywood learn that near-television quality production studios and an army of unskilled-but-super polite craftsmen is just a 26-hour flight away, all those jobs will return and then some!

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Yes, this is a real New Zealand passport stamp.

If you had any doubt that the real New Zealand is exactly how it was

Wellington, where director Peter Jackson and much of the post production is based, has renamed itself “the Middle of Middle Earth”, as fans held costume parties and city workers prepared to lay 500 m (550 yards) of red carpet.
“It’s been a 10-year wait for these movies, New Zealand is Tolkien’s spiritual home, so there’s no way we’re going to miss out,” said office worker Alan Craig, a self-confessed Lord of the Rings “nut”. [Yahoo]

Ahh, yes, Tolkien’s spiritual home that he never set foot in. Not to be confused, of course, with Tolkien’s actual home, England.

In any case, if you’re planning to travel to New Zealand for The Hobbit premiere, before you go, please review our CIA Fact Sheet: New Zealand that we’ve put together.

POLITICAL STRUCTURE

• The Prime Minister of New Zealand is chosen once a year at the country’s fall hayride, traditionally held behind Toby Smith-Goodwin’s pumpkin patch, and decided by a sack race.

• The legislative branch consists of 10 “Exalted Ewes,” one representing each farm, who introduce bills by loudly clacking together a pair of decorative bull’s hooves called “clackies.” A Ewe can veto a bill after it’s been clackied, but only if he can chug the cider boot before the bill’s author can run around the speaker’s recliner three times. If the Ewe circles the recliner thrice before the cider has been chugged, the bill is clackied into law. “Gazzay!” The Ewes shout, throwing their stocking caps into the air, as is traditional.

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