Ward has made acclaimed short films and won praise for his debut feature, "Vigil" (1984), the first New Zealand-produced to be shown in competition at Cannes. Ward then spent four years making "The Navigator" (1988), a visually stunning fantasy about a group of men from plague-ridden, medieval England who tunnel through the earth--and time--into 20th-Century Australia in an attempt to save their village. He followed up with the intense romantic saga, "Map of the Human Heart" (1993).