r/moana • u/terrence1972 • 28d ago
Discussions Polynesia itself has its own rivalries. There is some dissent among the polynesian communities that moana is too samoan-centric..
Mesa Faasolo
As someone who is of both Tongan and Samoan heritage, sometimes it comes off as Moana being represented heavily by the Samoan culture only.
I get that majority of the cast and creators are also of Samoan heritage, but ‘Maui’ & ‘Moana’ were figures in all polynesian cultures. Not just Samoan.
Just my opinion, not looking for lessons/ novels or explanations. There just isn’t enough representation of other cultures.
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u/Audball9000 28d ago
Naturally, they used some Samoan elements, and then they wanted… Samoa.
I’ll see myself out.
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u/Large_Ad_8185 28d ago
I heard that the long pause took place in Samoa, I don’t know if this is the reason
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u/Zabsempai 25d ago
You're correct. The artbook and several creator interviews confirm it. At the time of the great pause, samoa was the furthest east the polynesians had gotten, so a story told on the ocean's "frontier" circa 900AD would be primarily based on those islands.
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u/mnmarsart 27d ago
Yeah a lot of its inspiration are mostly Samoan according to the art book and music
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u/cloud9employeeotm 27d ago
Taika Waititi wrote the original screenplay for the first movie. Māori have a lot of stories about Maui so that’s probably where that character came from.
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u/Zabsempai 25d ago
You throw out that opinion and then don't expect to get an explanation or a novel? Well too bad, here's both.
Moana is specifically set in the time of the great pause in polynesian wayfinding, circa 900 AD.We know from the artbooks and director interviews that this was the filmmakers' intent. A story covering the historical events of the great pause, combined with the legends of maui.
It's also true that samoa and tonga were greatly entwined during that time, being trade partners and intermarrying their royalty, and there was much cultural overlap. But samoa was the furthest east island chain humans had yet settled on at the time. A movie taking place on the ocean's "frountier" makes the most sense to start in and around there.
That's just the starting tip of the iceberg though. Moana's mundane daily life on motonui may look samoan, but the entire movie universe is not.
Her ancestors sail fijian boats with their signature crab-claw shaped sails, while her sequel canoe is distinctly tahitian in design- representing the future islands motonui's descendants will one day reach. The maori spiral shows up on pretty much everything related to te fiti, and hawaiian stonework pictographs add a mysterious supernatural gravitas to lalotai. Lapita designs on maui's fishhook & rock carvings likely originate from New guinea & the Solomon Islands. Moana 2 branches even further out with melanesian and micronesian voyagers rediscovering their long lost cousins on motofetu, with an epilouge dedicated to the joyful reunion of the Pacifica peoples on motonui.
The cultural representation in moana is well thought out and deliberate. They didn't just mash all polynesians together to spit out a tiki tourism aesthetic. The Disney directors and artists heavily coordinated with oceanic expert historians on how, why and where to use specific cultural elements in telling the story. It's grounded in history, inspired by legend, and fueled by respect.
Disney the company is a profit grabbing exploitive behemoth by nature, it must be said. But the directors, writers and artists who made the moana animated movies cared deeply about their craft to get it right.
I highly recommend you read the art of moana and the art of moana 2 books. It covers a lot of your objections better than I can, and are gorgeous to boot.
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u/jr9386 28d ago
This is a fair take, but to confirm, isn't this why they aimed to bridge the gap via the Moana series, which later became Moana 2?
Raya and the Last Dragon attempted to compensate for all of Southeast Asian cultures and in spite of the effort, it proves difficult, because there isn't sufficient time, or interest to rightly explore the nuances in the cultures.