The NZFC joins the New Zealand film industry in farewelling veteran exhibitor, Joe Moodabe.
Born into a cinema family, Joe, alongside brothers Royce and Michael, started his industry career working for Amalgamated, a chain of cinemas owned and operated by his father and uncle with investment from 20th Century Fox.
Following the sale of Amalgamated in the mid-1980s to Hoyts, Joe remained in a senior management position. In 1997 he was headhunted and appointed general manager of Village Force Cinemas. In this role, he built the business to become the country’s largest cinema chain. Key to the expansion was merging Village Force Cinemas with arthouse chain, Rialto Cinemas, giving the company access to both mainstream and arthouse cinema audiences. In 2006 the chain was purchased by SkyCity and renamed SkyCity Cinemas with Joe as the Executive Chairman of the Board, a role which allowed him to concentrate on programming the existing screens and overseeing the development of new locations.
A great lover of cinema, Joe watched around five films a week for most of his life. He invested in local hit Sione’s Wedding, but this was his sole foray into feature film financing.
Joe’s funeral will be at 2pm, Friday 13 December at St. Michael’s, 6 Beatrice Road, Remuera, Auckland.