Directed by Marianne George, Jacob Penchansky, Dixon Holland, H. M. Wyeth
Country of Origin United States
Runtime-56:22
We are the living crew of Lata, our Polynesian culture-hero who built the first voyaging canoe and navigated across the Pacific. We use only ancient designs, materials, and methods, and we invite everyone to reconnect with ancestors and sustainable lifeways. This is the real Moana!
In our recently isolated Polynesian community, we live the story of our ancestral culture-hero, Lata. To make a voyage Lata needs crew. He welcomes men, women and children, hard workers with skills and applicants of dubious character, including a sailing anthropologist. Our community blesses our vessel, and we learn how to sail the open ocean in Lata’s arms, interacting with winds, waves, stars, and other signs that our ancestors show us when we need them. We arrive at islands and learn what happened to family members since the last voyage, generations earlier. We reconcile, reaffirm our love for each other, and look to our future together
Director Biography – Marianne George, Jacob Penchansky, Dixon Holland, H. M. Wyeth
Dr. Marianne “Mimi” George is an anthropologist, sailor, and writer specialized in voyaging cultures. Before the Vaka Taumako Project, she documented voyaging traditions of islanders in New Ireland, Papua New Guinea, Siberian Yupik Eskimos on the Alaskan and USSR sides of the Bering Straits. Her research voyages have included using ancient polar technology, and the early 19th century European technique of wintering-over in a sailboat frozen in the sea-ice of Antarctica. In the Vaka Taumako Project she studies Polynesians building vessels and making voyages using ancient technology, materials, tools, and navigation methods.. Mimi made 25 inter-island voyages in the Santa Cruz Islands, and one voyage from Duffs through Vanuatu, either under the sailing directions of Te Aliki Kaviea or with him on board.Director Statement
We, the Voyagers films were the idea of Te Aliki Koloso Kaveia of Taumako. He wanted his grandchildren to learn to use video cameras and make films about their voyaging culture. There is no electric or phone or other communication service on Taumako. So, it took 26 years to make these films. Many volunteers shot video, produced and directed, wrote scripting, narrated, made edits, etc. Vaka Valo Association of Taumako has appointed Daisy Mahaina to produce, direct, and video part 3, which will be,the final part in the We, the Voyagers series.