Whale Rider - A Whale-y Warm Tail on Family

Whale Rider movie poster from IMDb

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility GIF from Spiderman GIFs

"With great power comes great responsibility." 

- Uncle Ben, Spider Man

  Being a leader is never easy; especially when you have to shoulder the responsibility of leading a group of people, what more a whole village. Leadership plays a central role throughout this movie, as we had to watch the struggle of a family balancing their responsibility to the village as the direct descendants of past village heads, and the bonds within their own family. **SPOILER ALERT!** Here we follow the story of Koro, the village head and the grandfather of Paikea, who is supposedly next in line as the new village chief that Koro refuses to accept because Paikea is a girl. A female village chief in Koro's point of view is a severe violation of their community's centuries-old customs as in their lineage there has never been a head of the village who was a girl. Koro has stubbornly denied Paikea of her turn as the new village chief by refusing to teach her the traditions of their village chief ancestors. Slowly, a rupture begins to form in their own familial ties as Koro's relationship with Paikea begins to grow distant because of this issue. However, Koro does not seem like a villain in this movie; it was easy to understand why Koro did what he did because of the current state of the community of his village. 

  The village is not what it was like back in the old days as the movie portrays the ancient traditions of a community falling prey to the ugly side of modernisation; drinking and smoking has become such a way of life in this community that the village's traditions are slowly fading away because nobody is practicing it anymore - even the children are smoking! It seems like smoking and drinking are becoming the new traditions of the village. To Koro, he feels that he holds the burden of keeping the community together. Being the village chief, he feels the need to keep this detrimental way of life at bay by preserving their traditional ways. Hence, Koro's strong resistance against Paikea being the next village chief is due to this very reason. By having a new village chief who is female, Koro thinks that this will further derail the community from their heritage even further, and since a village head is the pillar of the community's traditional bond and a role, a female village chief may break the bond within the community and give the message that straying from tradition is okay in these modern times, which will ultimately destroy their village's customs and traditions. Koro's stance was manifested by his fear of watching the village slowly destroy itself under his leadership.

  The irony in this whole turn of events is that Koro's adamant determination in keeping the village's traditions alive is also blinding him to other aspects of tradition. In Koro's effort to maintain for males to be the new village chief, he has to be reminded by his own wife on the tradition of selecting a new village head, which is retrieving the rei puta (whale tooth) that he threw out to sea. Paikea was the one who retrieved the rei puta which makes her the true heir to the title of village chief, and it was until that Paikea was willing to risk her life by riding a whale out to sea is when Koro finally accepts Paikea's destiny. We can see Koro's struggle is not an easy one to deal with as he is constantly plagued by the stress of electing a new village chief and becoming the grandfather to his dear Paikea. As he is being torn between juggling these two roles, it is no wonder he became depressed and hides himself in shame when he failed to choose the new village chief and failed to be the grandfather that Paikea looks up to.

  Speaking of family, it was also pleasant to watch familial resemblances in the movie itself, as Paikea takes on certain traits that run in the family. For example, Paikea shares a striking similarity to all her family members for her stubbornness and defiance. It was entertaining to watch the stubbornness of Koro of refusing to accept Paikea as the next village as well watching the stubbornness of Paikea refusing to give in to her grandfather's orders and continues to pursue in her effort to become the next village head. Paikea also shares the same stubbornness with her father, Porourangi as he was also hard-headed in pursuing his dreams of becoming an artist instead of following the footsteps of Koro as chief. Paikea also shares this same stubbornness and determination with her Nanny as she is always defying Koro's wishes for Paikea by secretly asking Paikea to train in the art of taiaha with her Uncle Rawiri, as well as keeping Paikea's retrieval of the rei puta a secret from Koro until the time was right. 

  As the name of the movie suggests, whales play a very symbolic and spiritual meaning to the Maori community. It was an eye-opening experience to watch the fables and legends of the Whale Rider and how whales play an important aspect to the Maori community. Hence, it was interesting to watch how Niki Caro brings out the symbolism of whales in the movie, as he uses footages of whales to narrate certain scenes in the movie that leaves the audience to their own interpretation of the whale scenes in relation to the movie plot. I remember one particular scene of Paikea resting on the hospital bed after the climatic scene of her riding the whale out into the sea. In this scene, Koro showed that he has finally accepted for who Paikea is by wearing the rei puta over her head, and says in his native Maori language to the unconscious Paikea that he is nothing more than a fledgling who has just begun to spread his wings. This signifies his humility in comparison to Paikea's wisdom who surpasses her own age and Koro's experience. In the middle of this scene, a scene of two whales was shown and it showed one whale who was swimming beside another whale at first, begins to swim under the other whale. This was a significant scene to me as the two whales could be seen as Paikea and Koro, and the whale who swam underneath the other whale is Koro as he begins to realise true humility and acceptance for Paikea to take on her true destiny as village chief, and his acceptance has finally helped the village flourish like before, as well as mending the relationship between him, Paikea and the rest of his family members. 

Forget Paris - An Unforgettable Movie

   I am not a sucker for romantic comedies because most of the time the movie plot doesn't make sense and it is really fictional compared to real life. But sometimes it is nice to mindlessly watch a romantic comedy movie for the laughs on low-brow humour and to release stress. Forget Paris came at the right moment as a great stress reliever from all the coursework :)

Forget Paris poster from IMDb

   It was also fun to see a repetitive scene being used in the buildup for a humourous scene. There was a particular scene where Ellen's father is always repeating the Toyota tagline - "You asked for it, you got it." Viewers of the movie may see this as just a senile old man repeating words that he sees along the street, but later in the movie, he repeated the tagline again after an argument between Ellen and Mickey, much to the masochism the enjoyment of the audience. The repetition of the tagline helps to ingrain the phrase into the audience's memory, and when it was used again later in the movie, it showed how a seemingly meaningless phrase at first takes on a more symbolic meaning when the phrase was repeated again in a different context. The "You asked for it, you got it" tagline that came after an argument between Ellen and Mickey primed the audience to believe that Mickey deserved the argument between him and Ellen as he was the one who started the argument by his actions, which was karma in action.

   Much of the humour also comes from Mickey's personality as a sarcastic character, as his witty comebacks in situations helps liven up scenes that are usually a bore, especially during romantic scenes. There was this particular exchange of dialogue between Mickey and Ellen when Ellen offered to bring Mickey around Paris for sightseeing which goes like this:

Mickey: I was thinking of doing some sightseeing.

Ellen: Sightseeing? In Paris? What a bizarre notion.

Mickey: Sure. You got any stuff here?

Ellen: Yeah, we got some stuff. Would you like to see the Eiffel Tower?

Mickey: That's here?

   And the fact that Mickey is saying all these sarcastic lines with a straight face makes the movie even funnier as it shows that he is really serious about his sarcastic remarks, and that made the audience laughed even more.

   Humour aside, there were many psychological elements in the movie if you watch it with your psychology student lens on. Out of all the romantic comedy movies that I have watched, Forget Paris has clearly highlighted how romance does not always go the way that you intend for it to go; there will always be periods of  friction and conflict apart from the smooth sailing and happy moments in a romantic relationship. I believe the main theme of the romantic relationship between the main characters, Mickey and Ellen, is compromise. At the beginning of the movie itself, it seems like Mickey is the one who is always compromising with Ellen, **SPOILER ALERT!** as Mickey is the one who delayed his flight back to America to stay in Paris and be with Ellen. It may have seemed sweet and romantic of Mickey at first, but as the film progresses, we can see the effects of being overly compromising rear its ugly head. For example, Mickey is always compromising with Ellen's request by moving out of his apartment unit to stay in a newly purchased landed property with her, as well as letting Ellen's father live with the both of them. Mickey has also put refereeing career on hold and took up a job as a car salesperson he loathes just to satisfy Ellen, as his job as a referee is requires him to be travelling most of the time, much to the dissatisfaction of his wife. In order to please her, Mickey took up the job selling cars for over a year just so that Ellen could be with Mickey. But as soon as she got a promotion, her working hours were different from Mickey's, hence they were not able to see each other during the weekdays.

   Eventually, Mickey became really upset with the way his life was at that moment and soon his and Ellen's marriage went on a downward spiral because he is tired of compromising with Ellen all the time as they were always fighting and they have not engage in sexual activities with each other for a long time. It was interesting to see that in order to save their marriage, both of them were actually able to come to an agreement together for the first time after a long time to try for a baby. When they realised Ellen is unable to conceive a child, their relationship just continues to deteriorate until they both went their separate ways. In a cliché-ed turn of events at the end, Ellen has finally shown compromise in a symbolic scene of her visiting Mickey's workplace for the first time ever, as Mickey was always the one visiting Ellen at her office ever since they met in Paris. Hence, we can see that compromise is really important in a healthy relationship, and for compromise to happen, it is obvious that good communication should exist between each partner so couples can actively resolve issues together, hence leading to a healthy relationship together.

The Clichéd Yet Starstruck Storytelling of Strictly Ballroom

Strictly Ballroom movie poster from movieposter.com

The music, the steps, the energy; you can feel it when you're watching Strictly Ballroom directed by Baz Luhrmann. I have to admit that the plot for this movie was really clichéd, **SPOILER ALERT!** two people meet each other through dance; one is a great dancer admired by many while the other is a dancer who has just started with her beginner classes, often looked down upon by people, and together they try to reach the goal of winning a prestigious dance competition but was faced with opposition and obstacles. Of course, sparks of romance flew along the way. Although the story line was cheesy and predictable to a certain extent, Strictly Ballroom was clichéd in a good way. In my opinion, what Baz Luhrmann was not didn't really focused on his plot, but he on the elements within his movie to keep the audience engaged to the film. An obvious element of this would be the music and the cinematography of the dancing scenes in the movie. Baz did an amazing job of bringing out the joy of dancing through the way he captures dance on his film; from the joy on the main character Scott Hastings' face as he twirled and flew everywhere around his residential dance studio dancing to his own steps, to his enjoyment in learning a new form of dance by the father and grandmother of Fran, his new dance partner. As a person who has learned dance before, it was interesting to see the contrast between the two types of dance in this movie as it encompasses two different styles of dancing. The ballroom dance that Scott has initially learned and mastered portrays the rigidity, technique, and finesse in every routine that is done, which is a stark contrast to the Paso Doble that Fran grew up with in her household, which is a Spanish dance style focusing on the rhythm and to dance your own steps according to the rhythm. Throughout the movie, it was really enjoyable to see Scott learning the Paso Doble in addition to the ballroom that he is familiar with, all because he is open to new ideas that allows him to dance his own steps. With every step that Scott and Fran (and occasionally Scott's dad, Doug) took as they danced to upbeat music and their own steps, especially towards the end of the movie, it was almost tempting to get up and dance the Paso Doble to the music, even after the last scene has ended and the song rolled along with the credits.

The transformation of a character from a 'zero to hero' perspective was also interesting to watch in this movie. It was great to watch Fran as she transformed from a seemingly beginner dance student at the dance studio Scott was in, to become one of the best elite dancers showcased on the Pan-Pacific Grand Prix Dancing Championships. The movie showed how Fran achieved such a milestone in her dancing career, and it was not an overnight feat; the film showed how she trained with Scott every evening in the months leading up to the Championships. Fran was seen starting off as clumsy and forgetful of her steps at first. Her grit and determination for her love of dance was was sparked her philosophy of dancing her own steps, and that is why she was willing to confront Scott to learn to dance her own steps with another person who shares a similar view with her. This transformation from zero to hero reminded me of an anime called Naruto.

Naruto poster from Hulu

Set in a time of ninjas, Naruto Uzumaki (the yellow-haired boy in the orange jumpsuit in the poster) was a boy learning to become a ninja, to achieve his dream of becoming Hokage, or the Chief of his village. The Hokage is one of the best ninjas in his village. However, he is boy of no talent and is also clumsy and playful throughout his ninja training days, but over time, he pushed through hardship and disbelief from everyone that he can't achieve his dreams with the ability he has. Through his blood, sweat, and tears, he has finally achieved his dream of being Hokage after saving the whole ninja world from the forces of evil. This is why I think Naruto is a lot like Fran; both are clumsy and seemingly have no skills at first, but they achieve their goals and became successful through hard work and determination.

A third observation that I have made from watching Strictly Ballroom was the relentlessness and drastic measures that people are willing to take in order to ensure things will go as it is intended to go. In opposition to Scott's and Fran's climb to reach the Pan-Pacific Dance Championships, there were people who were against their dancing philosophy, which was to dance to their own steps. The people who were strongly against Scott's and Fran's partnership include Barry Fife, the President of the Australian Dance Federation, and even Scott's own mother, Shirley Hastings. Barry Fife was willing to use deceit and fraud to ensure that Scott will dance in the Championships like how Ballroom dancing has been danced traditionally, he has even brought up a manipulated story of the past on Scott's father's loss and embarrassment when he lost the Championships back then because of his own 'experimentation' with his own dance steps, all to make sure Scott dances 'appropriately'. When he failed to adhere to Barry's requests, Barry took to fraud by fixing that the Champion title goes to a certain pair, to ensure that Scott and Fran does not become Champions with their own steps. Scott's mother on the other hand, Shirley, did her best to stop Scott from dancing with Fran by saying discouraging words to Fran to make her go back home. Deceitful as they may be, I believe that both Barry and Shirley did what they did out of fear; a fear of the unpredictable outcome if Scott and Fran were to win the Championships with their unconventional steps. Evolutionary speaking, people feel a fear of the unknown because they are unable to anticipate what is coming towards them, which from a survival point of view, puts them at a disadvantageous position. Hence, people are more willing to conform to familiar methods to avoid the risk of being killed by predators or enemies. In the modern world, the fear of being killed is translated into the fear of failure. For Barry, he may have felt afraid on where the world of ballroom might head to if Scott and Fran were to win the Championships; people may feel inspired to follow the footsteps of Scott and Fran to dance their own steps, which to Barry may ultimately lead to the death of a dance form steeped in tradition. As for Shirley, Scott's and Fran's partnership in the Championships is frightful for her as she doesn't know how their partnership and their style of dancing may affect the reputation of her dance studio. She is afraid that Scott and Fran may humiliate the whole dance community with their wacky steps, and this might ruin the reputation of Shirley's dance studio as a home for crazy and lousy dancers. Hence, that is why I think Barry and Shirley took those desperate measures out of fear.

Speaking of fear, I guess this is why the quote that Fran told Scott in her native Spanish struck a chord within me:

Quote design by Audrey Torres

In English, it means "a life lived in fear is a life half-lived". I do feel that Barry's and Shirley's fears have consumed them over the rest of the second half of their lives, as most of their time was spent worrying what might happen in the future, so they did not truly enjoy their lives as professional dancers. At first, Scott was demotivated to join the Championships with his own steps until Fran confronted him, while Fran climbed over her fear to ask Scott to dance with her. Together, Scott and Fran was able to overcome obstacles by adhering to the quote that Fran inherited from her grandmother. I guess as a takeaway from this movie, we gain strength in numbers; if we can find like-minded who share the same values and determination in life as ourselves, we will be empowered to step out of our comfort zones and conquer our fear of the unknown, as the possibilities are endless.