"Quite a ride": 'The Lives of My Father' seems almost too hard to believe

Author: Newstalk ZB,
Publish Date: Sat, 20 Jun 2026, 10:32am

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There’s A Hole In My Bucket (Doc Edge Festival 2026)

When Royd Tolkien, great-grandson of J R R Tolkien, loses his brother, Mike, to Motor Neurone Disease (ALS), Mike leaves behind one final act of love and mischief: a bucket list of 50 challenges designed to drag his reluctant, comfort-zone-hugging brother into the land of the living. What follows is an unexpected journey across New Zealand that pushes a grieving man further than he ever imagined possible.

Narrated by Benedict Cumberbatch, with Peter Jackson, Billy Boyd, John Rhys-Davies and Weta Workshop along for the ride, the film is a raucous, tender argument that the best eulogy isn’t a speech, it’s a bucket list.

The Lives of My Father (Doc Edge Festival 2026)

Didrik thought his Norwegian father was a journalist. In reality, he was a CIA spy who fired AK-47s in the Kuwaiti desert and infiltrated cocaine laboratories in Colombia. When Didrik finds a box of old tapes and documents in his father’s attic, he uncovers a story almost too strange to be true. For the first time his father, Bjørn, begins to speak openly about his past.

As Didrik digs deeper, the life and lies of a man who blurred the lines between journalism, propaganda, and international espionage begins to emerge. But can any of it be trusted?

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