By Ali Ikram
He's been called the world's most provocative filmmaker and once infiltrated North Korea posing as a communist comedian.
Now Maz Brugger is here for the New Zealand International Film Festival where his latest work The Ambassador is playing.
“Here ends my life as a Danish journalist, what awaits me is a life where I can operate freely beyond all moral boundaries known to man and travel that world with a suitcase full of diamonds,” Brugger says in the film. “What I’m talking about is of course a life as an African diplomat.”
Brugger spoke to 3 News about the film.
“If I was going to go to the Central African Republic and said I’m here to expose neo-colonialism and corrupt I’d be on the next plane out of the Central African Republic."
Brugger was a newsreader on Danish TV but gave it up to become Liberia’s man in the Central African Republic.
"Some of the time it is very intoxicating driving through the capital in a high speed SUV with a sinister diamond mine owner with your two pygmy assistants. It's a very marvellous feeling…you should give it a go."
The Ambassador begins with Brugger buying a Liberian diplomatic passport. It turns out to be his ticket to a world of shady characters - blood diamonds and corruption at the highest level.
“It is better to prepare some money for the minister like an envelope of happiness no problem."
What follows is one of the boldest pieces of gonzo journalism ever attempted, and one of the funniest.”
But Brugger isn't losing much sleep over the diamond barons he fooled catching up with him.
"I believe that most of the men have a lot of problems and I would be for them a minor problem and hopefully they will forget about it."
He puts his approach down to what he was taught at school - when you say something serious always say something funny.
3 News