Whiripapa: Tāniko, Whānau and Kōrero-Based Film Analysis

Abstract

The content of this thesis is the representation of Māori in New Zealand film and in New Zealand film studies. The thesis, however, goes much further than this, in that I explore film theory, film audiences and film history, three crucial areas in the film studies discipline, and I consider these important aspects by theorising them through mātauranga Māori and mātauranga-ā-iwi parallels. My motivation has been to ensure Māori and Pacific Island students of Film, Television and Media Studies (MAPIS) have a pathway to a deeper understanding of film studies. In the current teaching of New Zealand film studies, there is very little about Māori outside Post-Colonial theory discourse, there are no specifically ‘Māori’ film audience studies, and there are very few Māori scholars writing specifically in film history. This thesis, therefore, explores ways film studies could become more relevant to MAPIs, simply by using cultural theories that are generally taken-for-granted knowledge, and writing their own stories into New Zealand film history. The project weaves a ‘whiripapa,’ a three-stranded cord or rope, with each strand representing a specific tool developed primarily as a point-of-commencement to support MAPIs in their study of film. In the theory strand I look at mahi-toi, and more specifically Whatu Tāniko, a fine-finger weaving process and technique, to discuss theory and to inspire a film analysis tool to aid in the close reading of film texts from a specific world-view. The methodologies strand focuses on whānau-centred research groups called Rōpū Whānau, which have been conducted in four Hunga Mātakitaki or viewing audiences amongst my two predominant hapū. The history strand borrows the kōrero shared in the Rōpū Whānau to construct a kōrero-based New Zealand film history. These kōrero are divided into four cinematic eras (silent cinema to 1939, 1940-1969, 1970s and 1980s, and the 1990s). I use the tāniko-based film analysis tool to analyse a selection of films (generally two or three) from each era, and centre each one on a constant through-line of kōrero. Although each tool in this thesis can stand on its own, the whiripapa acknowledges that the tools are more useful when each one is understood and interconnected with the other. Therefore this thesis continually interweaves tāniko, whānau and kōrero as the unbroken whiripapa through the centre. In developing these tools, mātauranga becomes relevant to film studies, and as a result MAPIs are more likely to see success and, I hope, will excel in the discipline.