Watching Ka Whawhai Tonu in Greymouth’s Regent Cinema, with whanau and two other people was a revelation. Finally, NZ filmmaking has reached maturity. The action, beautifully restricted to virtually a single location, the defensive stockade at Ōrakau, has the real time flow of a Greek tragedy.  With the emphasis on the young, the future is being preserved via the inevitably doomed but heroic attempt to hold the defensive line against the colonialists. The two teenage protagonists are beautifully imagined: the reluctant spirit channeller and the half caste, traumatised by his guilty, possessive, militaristic  Pākeha father. The te reo dialogue and subtitles are both vibrant and resonant.

But it is the authenticity and honesty of the cultural portrayal which is, for me, new. These are two warrior cultures  clashing, with all the intricacy of the Māori warrior culture on display – from iwi rivalry to slavery, to ritual sacrifice, to the mana, wisdom and occasional irony of the rangatira.  ‘Learn to lie better’ is surely a classic survival tool of realpolitic. The spiritual confusion of recent conversion to Christianity, the mana and self possession of the women, the cheekiness and charm of the kids, are all on display. In contrast, the colonial soldiers are scared and confused, faced with the life and death of serial slaughter. Finally, the fine portrayal of the boy’s complex father: well on the way to the racist ideology that will come to rule the country, an ideology derived from greed, the need to conquer, confusion and guilt, even a parody of love. There is no romanticism here, no persecutor/victim/rescuer syndrome and that is a great relief.

It is a brave and uncomfortable film, occasionally visceral in its impact, the sabre/taiaha duel a symbolic highlight. Finally, the back story, the skeleton in the boy’s closet, is left to near the end, enabling the concluding image of the boy’s kuia, still living in an autonomous zone in Te Urewera welcoming his return to his turangawaewae.

Politically, this becomes the message, the need for the autonomous zone, whether it be the King Country of Rewi Maniapoto or the seclusion of Te Urewera, or an authentic Aotearoa film culture.  

Congratulations to Mike Jonathan and Tim Worrell, both of whom have earned this moment through decades of cultural and artistic pilgrimage. I salute you.

When I was working on bicultural theatre projects in the early 1980s I would on occasion listen to Karlite Rangihau telling stories of pre Pākeha Tuhoe culture and think, What a wondrous film that story would make. Given that this is Mike Jonathan’s first feature perhaps that is a path he might venture upon.