Sunday, November 3, 2013

Sione's Wedding and Sione's 2

The infamous Sione's Wedding. One of New Zealand's more popular films. This plot revolves around 4 Samoan boys on the quest to find the perfect date in order to have permission to attend Sione's Wedding. Of the four man characters there is Michael - the leader of the group and the ladies man, Albert - the good mummys boy, Sefa - the party boy and Stan - the weird one. These characters and their stories from Sione's Wedding continue into Sione's 2: Unfinished Business. The Sione's movies cover the biggest events in a pacific Islanders life - Their wedding, and funeral.

Through out these films, something our group identified as we analysed  them was that growing up is the most predominant theme in both films. During the first film this is clearly demonstrated in the scene where the boys are called to the minister's meeting. They sit on the floor resembling primary school children as the minister tells them off and shows them everything they've each done wrong. As the film progresses we see how each character begins to make that change possible.

Michael who has notoriously dated white girls begins to change when he meets Albert's cousin, Princess, and decides she is a good Samoan girl who he'd like to settle down with. It isn't revealed until the end of the film that Princess happens to be a female version of Michael, giving him a taste of his own medicine. Of which he does not like when he reacts badly to Princess feeling up another man at the wedding she was meant to be attending with Michael.

Albert grows up by dating his work colleague, Tania. Giving him the independency he needed from his Mum to solidify Albert's transition into adulthood. Albert had the best head on his shoulders out of all the boys in the group. Being the most sensible it was he that often tried to keep the boys in line and came up with the plan to find suitable dates in order to be able to attend Sione's Wedding. In Sione's 2, Albert and Tania have taken their relationship further and bought a house together. This causes the other boys in the group, mainly Sefa and Stan to criticise Albert telling him he's changed when ironically all of them have. The only difference is Albert's grown up. To which Albert replies "so me and my woman bought a house together. Thats what people do when they, you know, grow up"

Of all the boys in their 'Duckrockers' group Sefa may have the most considerable changes. Sefa is the party boy of the group who is no stranger to coming home in the early hours of the morning with smell of alcohol stron on his breath, waking up the love of his life Leilani, only to frustrate or anger her with each passing weekend until she finally had enough and moved back to her family home. It wasnt until Leilani's pregnancy was discovered that Sefa's change begun to take motion. At first Sefa didnt respond appropriately to the news, too shocked to answer Leilani she closed the door on him once more. In the second film, Sione's 2, Sefa and Leilani have more kids and overcome their relationship issues to wed eachother finally.

Lastly, my favourite character of all, Stanley. Im not entirely sure why Stan was my favourite character. It may have been because he was the odd one out in all of the group. Stan is weird. And it is difficult to understand him, but maybe that is not the purpose of the character, he may only be there to fill in gaps of comedy the Sione's films would not possess without him. I think the main reason Stanley is my favourite is, not only for his humour, but also because in both the films he seems to struggle with his identity. Something I am very familiar with. In the first movie Stan is involved with online dating under his alter ego 'Tyrique' in which he pretend to be a stereotypical modern American Gangster with his attempts at smooth pick up lines to attract females. Ironically, in the second film, Stan becomes a devout follower of a parodic take on what seems to be the destiny church within New Zealand.

Over all I believe the Sione's movies are adequate movies to watch if they are only taken by face value or if there is nothing else to watch on a Sunday evening. Joshua Iosefa write his well known spoken word poem, 'Brown Brother,' in which he says
"...Your words are a mockery to my skin tone or colour. No but Brown Brother youve been doing that since the day you performed Cinderella, or BroTown, Sione's Wedding and do i have to metion the GC? Now i dont mean to condescend, these shows are great dont get me wrong. But can anyone explain, will there ever be a time where our representation goes deeper than putting our own skin to shame? Will the stereotype of an illiterate, unintelligent polynesian still be the same? Will it ever change? Or are we still going to sell ourselves short for a few seconds of fame?"

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