Vai (2019)

Luka Amber Leleiga Lim-Cowley-Bunnin | Ia; They/Them | Vaigaga, Saanapu, Safotu, Falelatai, Xiàmén, Kuldiga

“For us, it’s never one issue. We live complicated lives. We’re constantly having to negotiate different challenges. And that’s my job […]. It’s to remind people of the complexity and not let them try to paint us with a single brush stroke.” —Teresia Kieuea Teaiwa, 2015.

When watching Pasifika films, I often approach with a mix of celebration and apprehension. Considering the barriers to telling Pasifika stories via this medium, and our vivid absences in Pākehā media, that Pasifika films have been and continue to be created is laudable. Apprehension because… the ideas expressed in Pasifika films and I don’t always get along.

Vai was directed by nine Pasifika women directors, with stellar performances by the main actresses, and stunning cinematography. We are taken from Fiji to Tonga, the Solomon Islands, Aotearoa, Kūki ‘Āirani, Sāmoa, Niue, and then back to Aotearoa again, comprising nine stories, each about a Pasifika girl and/or woman named Vai experiencing significant life events, such as talking with a faraway relative (no spoilers), migration, and welcoming a baby into a whānau with four generations present. Themes discussed include family, culture, diaspora, and indigenous sovereignty.

This film got me in the feels so many times; it was amazing to hear Pasifika indigenous languages being spoken through much of the film. The most resonant chapter for me is the sixth. Here, a Sāmoan Vai in her fifties does a taualuga, in place of her daughter who never learned (fyi the reasons for this are often intricate, and assigning personal blame to youth for not knowing more about our cultures is counterproductive). In the few minutes beforehand, we see Vai fumbling through memories of movements, the numerous concerns of family members conveyed through a few mumbled comments. During her siva, however, her ancestors rise up from their graves to support her.

This scene brings up important questions about empathy. Why do people empathise? If I can empathise with a story, does this influence my perception of its value? I think we all know the answer. In Aotearoa-based Pasifika media, there are established patterns—because of New Zealand colonialism, racism, colourism, cisheteroperisexism, classism, and ableism—of portraying a narrow set of Pasifika lives and experiences.

Notably here, not all of the characters are from nations and cultures situated in Polynesia. Referencing South African anti-colonial languaging, these are ‘so-called’ Micronesia, Melanesia, Polynesia. As well as inherent racism, the reality of societies indigenous to Te Moana-Nui-A-Kiwa is beyond this three-part imposed paradigm, evidenced by the cumbersome necessity of the term ‘outlier’, *ahem* Rotuma—Happy Fäe‘ag Rotuma Week!

This next part of the review is perhaps less to do with this particular film’s directors and production, and more to do with larger orders in Pasifika art. I have no idea of the obstacles and struggles they went through to complete this formidable project, nor do I have knowledge of the discussions they had about how to tell these stories, so I commend them thoroughly for bringing Vai forth into the world, and mean no offence.