Meet the Director at special movie showing

May 6th, 2013

The Gecko Cinema is hosting a special screening of award winning documentary Maori Boy Genius, followed by a question-and-answer session with the director/producer Pietra Brettkelly (pictured, right).

The meet-the-director event will be held on Saturday 18th of May at 2pm. The documentary movie has received high praise, including four stars by the Christchurch Press last weekend.

Ngaa Rauuira (pictured, below) is precious, and gifted, a Matakite - a wiseman . . . but really he's just a child.

Obama broke the mould. Bolivia's Evo Morales broke the mould. And a teenager in New Zealand is breaking the mould to eventually stand in history with these leaders.

Maori Boy Genius is a coming-of-age film profiling future leader Ngaa Rauuira, railing against his people's statistics of uneducated youth, 40% of prisoners, and alarming suicide rates.

At 4 he learnt English. At 12 he began his first university degree. At 14 he googled international politics and came up with Yale University.

Ngaa's story reveals a family of eight on a modest income, committing to a US$35,000 Yale bill; a weighty tribal expectation that he will be the voice of his people and bring success in war dance competitions; laughing and crying with best friends; approaching adulthood and diverging pathways.

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