1 Cultural Translation and Filmmaking in the Pacficic

CULTURAL TRANSLATION AND FILMMAKING IN THE PACFICIC Vilsoni Hereniko Introduction When my feature film The Land Has Eyes screened at the Moscow International Film Festival in 2004, my producer/wife and I, the director and writer, were assigned a Russian translator. Since we don’t speak Russian, we were grateful for this service. However, during the introduction preceding the film screening, some members of the audience reacted in rather surprising ways to the translator’s version of what we had said, making us wonder about the accuracy of the translation. And then the film screened. No one laughed or made any audible sounds throughout the screening of our film. Everyone was so quiet you could hear yourself breathe. This was strange because we had just returned from screening the film eight times around Rotuma where the film was shot. There, the reaction was one of hilarity, with some audience members shouting mocking comments at the actors on screen, cheering when an old lady riding a scooter chased the villain, or slapping each other on the back as they burst into laughter when someone said or did something that they recognized as so typically Rotuman. Audience members teased the actors who sat among them, ridiculing them when they made an appearance and basically making quite a bit of noise. This was the first feature film 1 ever made on Rotuma, and seeing themselves on screen appeared to be a source of amusement, if not excitement. At several screenings, the chiefs had to order the audience to shut up so that others could hear the dialogue and follow the film’s plot. So how do we explain the silent reaction of the Russians? Are the Russians watching the same film the Rotumans saw? And then I remembered that a man in a nearby booth was providing a simultaneous translation of the film’s dialogue in Russian. What on earth was he telling them? And how do we know that he was translating accurately? About forty people stayed behind for the discussion that followed the film screening. Someone would ask a question in Russian, the translator would relay the question to us in English, we would answer, and then she would translate into Russian what we had said to the audience. I thought we were doing very well until a man put up his hand, and then talked in Russian for what seemed like two minutes. We listened politely until the man had stopped talking. The translator turned to me then asked in her Russian accent: “So how do you protect yourself from getting penetrated?” Thinking I hadn’t heard correctly, I asked her to please repeat her question. She did, revealing no embarrassment whatsoever. I looked at my wife, and realized she was pressing her fingernails into the palm of her hand so she wouldn’t burst into laughter. Taking my cue from my wife, I pulled myself together, and in as steady a voice as I could muster, asked 2 the translator to explain in more detail what the questioner wanted to know. Fortunately, the translator was able to provide a full account of what the man had said. It turns out that the man’s question should have been translated thus: “Rotuma is such a small island, so how does it protect itself from getting invaded?” My Russian experience with translation taught me many lessons, the first of which is that one should always be suspicious of translated accounts, particularly if there is no opportunity to question the translator. Imagine if I had returned from Russia without getting to the bottom (no pun intended) of what the translator really meant. I’d still be thinking that Russians are very rude people, preoccupied with protected sex! Now that I know better, I think they’re preoccupied with national security instead. Obviously, these are two very different readings of the same incident. It also confirms my belief that there is usually more nuance or cultural specificity in the original account than there is in the translated version. A second lesson I learnt is that the translated version, albeit unwittingly in my Russian experience, could end up becoming more entertaining and sexier than the reality. Think of titles of early Hollywood films set in the Pacific such as Bird of Paradise, The Blue Lagoon, South Pacific, Mutiny on the Bounty, Jungle Heat (1957), Girls! Girls! 3 Girls (1962), Wake of the Red Witch (1948), Enchanted Island (1995), and more recently, Blue Crush and Fifty First Dates. In October 2009, the Hawaiì International Film Festival screened the world premiere of a feature film on Hawaii’s princess Kaiulani under the title Barbarian Princess. According to the director of this film, he and the producers had chosen this title in order to attract white audiences from the continental United States. From this, we can infer that they were more concerned with making a profit at the box office than responding positively to local and Hawaiian protests against the use of the word “barbarian”. Ironically, film festivals on the continental United States and beyond did not want to screen this film, and so the filmmakers ended up having their world premiere where their real audience resides, which is in Hawaiì. Unfortunately, the word “barbarian”, which the producers claim is meant to be ironic, is not in inverted commas, a fact that makes one suspicious of the motives of the filmmakers. Further, the film itself makes numerous references to Princess Kaiulani’s beauty and intelligence, with just a fleeting mention that she is from a barbaric race. Wouldn’t the title “Hawaiian Princess”, “Beloved Princess”, even “Hawaiian Soul” be more fitting labels? In spite of the good intentions of many indigenous filmmakers, including Pacific Islanders, to capture the complexity of our cultures as we know them, the medium of 4 film, particularly the feature film, is a colonizing medium. By this I mean that the dictates of the market place, and the business aspects of film production and distribution, render it impossible for any film to do justice to lived reality, past or present. The most we can expect from feature films is a partial understanding of the culture or society portrayed on screen. The indigenous films that open to us windows through which we can see the diverse cultures of our world in ways that are most nuanced and culturally specific are the ones least concerned with reaping a profit at the box office. Quite often, but not always, these films are made primarily for the people whose lives are depicted on screen, with creative control, in most cases, resting in the hands of indigenous people. Such films include the Maori features Te Rua (1991) and Mauri (1988); the path-breaking Innuit film Atanajuart: the fast Runner (2001), Pear ta Ma Òn Maf: The Land Has Eyes (2004), and the Aboriginal film Ten Canoes (2006). Conversely the ones that are most influenced by globalizing forces and emphasize entertainment and broad appeal are those likely to be most susceptible to the dictates of the market economy. Needless to say, these indigenous films are more successful at the box office. Such films include Whale Rider (2001), Rabbit Proof Fence (2002), Smoke Signals (1998), No.2 (2006), Sione’s Wedding and Eagle vs Shark (2007). 5 I now look at five features from the Pacific in an effort to demonstrate the ways in which indigenous films are coerced to adhere to mainstream structures of storytelling and to keep cultural references either universal or familiar (as much as possible) to white mainstream audiences. My intention here is not to pass judgment on any of the films referred to in this paper but rather to illuminate the colonizing nature of the medium, particularly in relation to indigenous knowledge and translation for global audiences. Whale Rider In my opinion, Whale Rider provides us with the best example of a feature film that successfully combines art and commerce. It clearly demonstrates the necessity of catering to the tastes of the masses, more interested in entertainment than education. Exotic color that enhances the storyline makes the product different from the rest. By adhering to a well-known structure of storytelling as well as other familiar elements (beautiful cinematography, music, sound effects etc.) the film remains accessible and non- threatening. Released in 2001, Whale Rider is the story of Paikea, a young girl who defies patriarchy in her Maori culture to become the leader of her tribe. At the core of this film’s narrative is a folktale which explains that the original 6 inhabitants of the people of Whangara in Aotearoa New Zealand where Paikea resides arrived riding on the back of a whale. Claiming genealogical ancestry to the original whale rider, Paikea rekindles a mystical connection to the whales listing in the sea. When the pod of whales end up stranded on the beach, Paikea proves that she can be the new leader of her tribe by riding the lead whale. Koro, Paikea’s grandfather and male chauvinist who up until this point had been fiercely opposed to Paikea’s aspirations to leadership on the basis that only boys can lead, eventually succumbs to the evidence before him and bestows upon his granddaughter his blessings. The film ends with Paikea and her grandfather seated side by side inside a magnificent Maori waka (canoe) while community members row and chant in unison as they head out to sea, and symbolically, into the future. [Please refer to the video clip with the opening scene of Whale Rider – opening_scene_whale-rider.wmv] In spite of its overwhelming success worldwide, Whale Rider received mixed reactions among Maori people (see Hokowhitu 2008; Barry Barclay quoted in Calder 2003).

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