Kiwi filmmaker Leanne Pooley's documentary 25 April has made the long list of films in contention for best animated feature at next month's Academy Awards.
Pooley's film, a graphic-novel styled war epic following Kiwi soldiers during the eight-month Gallipoli campaign in WWI, is completely different to the other films that made the list, headed by family favourites Moana and Finding Dory.
The film recounts events at Gallipoli through the eyes of six people from a variety of backgrounds, from a Bay of Plenty carpenter to a Manawatu farmer and a New South Wales nurse. Their stories were chosen after a year of research, involving hundreds of diaries.
25 April is the only documentary among the 27 films to have made the cut, is the first Kiwi animated film in history to do so, and the only film on the list directed solely by a female.
"It's appalling there were 27 films and only one of them was directed by a woman, but at the same time it's quite nice to be pushing that boundary," Pooley told Newshub.
She has only just recovered from stage three breast cancer, which was diagnosed halfway through making 25 April. She says if she hadn't been making an animated film then she would have had to step aside and let someone else take over the project.
"Because this was animated it was created very, very slowly and the animators don't need the director there every day.
"Sometimes they only need you for a couple of hours every couple of days, which to be frank during my chemotherapy this was all I was able to manage.
"It was actually the perfect project for me to be working on while doing chemo and at the same time it kept me sane, without it I think I might have gone a little mad."
The 27 films will be boiled down to five finalists next week, and while 25 April is up against films from animation giants Disney and Pixar, Pooley believes her documentary's dark subject matter gives it a chance.
"What you kind of hope is that some of the voting members of the Academy chose to watch it because it is different, because it is an adult film, it isn't a children's or a family movie, it's completely different from every other single film on the list."
Another roadblock to Pooley's film making the final five is its lack of an Oscars campaign. Disney and Pixar have spent millions on campaigns for Finding Dory and Moana, and while 25 April was released in the US, there was no money to promote the film to the Academy.
"We certainly didn't give Hunt for the Wilderpeople a run for its money or anything like that in the cinemas, but I'm hoping it will have a long tail.
"I'm hoping it will become part of our Anzac Day menu if you like and hoping it will screen on television on Anzac Day in future."
Pooley, who has directed more than 20 documentaries spanning a 27-year career, was recently made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the New Year's honours list acknowledging her life's work.
"It was a real special thing for me on New Year's Day, because I spend my life as all filmmakers do basically begging for money and asking for an audience and asking for support and hoping you're going to get into this film festival."
If 25 April doesn't make the final five for the Academy Awards it has at least already received international recognition.
It premiered at the renowned Toronto International Film Festival and screened at the world's most prestigious animation film festival, the ANNECY festival in France, where only nine films were in competition.
"Watching that very, very New Zealand story with a French audience was quite special too, so that's been really beautiful.
"I was lucky that it all timed when I finished my treatment and I was just well enough to get to Toronto with my little bald head.
"To be able to take part in the premiere and experience it with a Canadian audience which given that I was born in Canada, that was special too."
Pooley is currently writing her first fiction film and says fear of the unknown is what keeps her creating.
"To be honest with you as a filmmaker every time you start a new project you're also terrified, and I haven't lost that.
"Every time I start a new project I think 'gosh, what am I thinking, what am I doing?' That fear doesn't go away. I think anyone who works in the arts will understand what I'm saying where the terror sets in early on and grips you until you sit with an audience for the first time.
"The fear keeps me from being complacent. I do try to push my own boundaries a little bit.
"I mean each of the last few films I've gone outside my comfort zone. I'd never worked in animation before, so 25 April was a massive learning curve but it was exciting because it was new and similarly Beyond the Edge, we made that in 3-D and that was exciting and challenging so I do intentionally try and put myself into a place where I'm terrified, so I must get off on it in some way.
"But, I'm never bored, that's the nice thing, I'm never, ever, ever bored."
Newshub.