White Lies
Film
Review
by Kam Williams
Adaptation
of New Zealand Novella Revolves around Skeleton in Family Closet
It is New
Zealand in the 1920s, a time when race was a hot button issue. And
the idea of mating across the Maori-Pakeha (European) color line was
still terribly taboo.
For this
reason, Paraiti (Whirimako Black), a native midwife, has
surreptitiously been summoned to the home of Rebecca Vickers (Antonia
Perbble), a wealthy white woman whose husband is out of the country
on business. "I am carrying a child that I cannot have,"
she quietly announces, adding, "I will pay you handsomely for
your assistance."
However,
the medicine woman is rather reluctant to perform an abortion,
because she has been trained to use her skills to heal, not to end a
life. In fact, the idea of terminating a pregnancy is so repugnant
that she tries to change Mrs. Vickers' mind.
After all,
despite delivering many a baby, she herself was never blessed with a
child. "I know women who would kill to have a baby," she
says, before suggesting, "Your husband will will forgive you,"
since "beauty softens any man's heart."
But the
cold-hearted matriarch will hear none of it, for she is hiding a deep
secret which she has apparently only shared with her trusted maid and
confidant, Maraea (Rachel House) . Uncompromisingly pro-life, Paraiti
proposes that she be permitted to induce labor prior to the
patriarch's return. That way the infant might be adopted without Mr.
Vickers ever knowing it existed.
Thus
unfolds White Lies, a skeletons-in-the-closet affair directed by Dana
Rothberg. Rothberg also adapted it to the screen from the novella
"Medicine Woman" by Witi Ihimaera, the author of Whale
Rider. This film slowly builds its tension around the scandalous
secret Rebecca's obviously hiding, and it all comes out in a big
reveal during a very dramatic denouement.
A deeply moving reminder of man's inhumanity to man in less enlightened
times.
Excellent
(3.5 stars)
Unrated
In English and Maori with
subtitles
Running time: 99 minutes
Distributor: ArtMattan Productions
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