Whale Rider

I watched a movie called “Whale Rider”. It was second time for me to watch it because I have watched it in the cross-cultural understanding class last year. But I didn’t remember the story. Because I didn’t watch it much. This movie is a dark.
The main character is a girl named Paikea. The place of the story is a village of Maoris, New Zealand. There was a tradition that a man become a patriarch in the village. But the patriarch’s eldest son had only a girl. That is Paikea. Actually, a boy was born as twins, but the boy and their mother dead shortly after delivery. So Koro who is the patriarch and Pai’s grandfather was very sad. Because he had no boy who must been the next patriarch. So Koro didn’t receive her, but he had a her love as a ground child, such as he took her to the school and meet her there by bicycle when they come back. Pai loved her grandfather too.
One day, Pai’s father came back to the village from German. But he refused to be a patriarch. He had a child in German, so he tried to go to German with Pai. But on second thought she decided to stay the village on the way to leave there. But Koro gave lessons to boys of the village to transmit a tradition to posterity. It was to someone of boys of the village is make to be a patriarch. He thought that the clan became unhappiness because she was born. She couldn’t take part in the lessons because she was a girl. So she watched the lessons secretly and got learn the tradition.
But Koro witnessed she won the boy in a taiaha, he was very very angry. After that, he throw a necklace had been passed down in their clan in the sea, and gave a test that a boy who could take it and be the patriarch. But anyone could not take it. He was shocked very much and he felt ill. She found the necklace and could take it. One day, a lot of whale washed up. Everyone tried to back them to the sea, but they couldn’t. but she sat astride it, a whale came back to the sea and the others came back too allured by the first whale. Koro assented she is a next matriarch, and she went to a maiden voyage to be a new matriarch.
I was impressed the end. But I didn’t like the movie because it is very dark and difficult. I thought that it is very difficult to save traditional culture. (448words)