The New Zealand International Film Festival is including a record number of nine local documentaries in its 2012 programme.

That includes veteran local documentarian Costa Botes' Last Dogs of Winter which follows New Zealander and former TV actor Caleb Ross to Churchill ("the Polar Bear Capital of the World") in the Canadian province of Manitoba, where he helped local character Brian Ladoon in his unconventional conservation efforts with the Qimmiq, Canada's endangered indigenous Eskimo dog. MORE>>