Whale Rider

“Whale Rider” is a very beautiful movie as it showcases the culture of Maori, a tribe who lives in east coast of New Zealand’s North Island and believes in whale as patron. It has beautiful language, songs and clothes, and people in the tribe have strong believe in whale and see it as a form of courage and survival. The movie mainly talks about how a little girl, Paikea, manages to break the traditional rules and becomes the first female chief of the tribe. It records her growth and her courage to introduce new concept towards the old minded people. From this movie, I could see the beauty of traditions, but also the downsides of traditions in restricting people’s lives. 

            Culture brings lots of beautiful impacts towards society. It introduces language, clothes, arts, and even legend stories. It also comes out with rules and customs that lead its people to live better in their lives. Besides, it provides regulations for its descendants to remember the glory days and avoid the past mistakes. Culture has become one of the techniques that helps people to connect with each other. By having culture exchange, people enjoy the traditions of different cultures and respect the dissimilarities, which promote human’s interactions. Moreover, by promoting the beauty of the culture, it encourages economic growth as people are willing to spend money in visiting places that are rich in cultural sense. 

            Culture, however, would also bring negative impacts towards its people. The traditions that have been passed down from ancient might restrict the development of the race. There are old-minded people who do not allow changes that can lead to development and would still stick with their belief unless they are proven wrong. They have been taught to follow the rules since young, which leads to their low tolerance towards ideas that challenge the long-existing rules. It can be seen in the movie that Koro, the chief of the tribe, insists to choose a leader who is the first-born male in the family. We can see how tolerance he is when he finds out his elder son is unwilling to assume the leadership and his first grandson is dead. Because of his strong believe on the selection of tribe’s leader, he has poor relationship with all of his family members. Although deep inside his heart he recognizes his second child and his granddaughter, the rules has hold him back from showing his love towards them. He would blame himself from not being able to be the good chief because he could not find the true leader who can lead to the tribe back to the glory days rather than giving an opportunity to him and his tribe to accept a new leader who is different from pass. Fortunately, his old-fashioned mind set changes in the end after he realizes his deep love towards his granddaughter. 

            Besides, culture has also limited women’s recognition in the society. It has been known that men will be the leader in the community and women should be the one who handles the family. Although it is biologically true as men show more physical power than women, it does not mean that women could not take the responsibility to lead others. Nowadays, the society portrays the idea of equality of sexes. However, there are still some cultures or traditions that are unwilling to accept the fact that women could become the leader. In their opinions, women should be the housewife who takes care of the family and serves the husband. In the movie, it shows people’s bias towards women. Koro, being the chief of the tribe, does not accept the idea that women could be the leader although he recognizes leadership from his granddaughter. He is also the male chauvinist who believes that he is the master in the family, which is interestingly untrue as he has a wise wife who is willing to tolerance to feed his arrogance. Although the women in the movie shows high intelligence, due to the traditions, they are not recognized. They also believe in the traditions that men should hold the power even though they are capable to manage issues. These have shown how traditions influence people’s ways of defining gender status, no matter in males or females. 

            It is undeniably that culture will bring impacts towards the society. It depends on people’s decision in practicing it or challenging it after the rapid development of today’s world.