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Notes -
Hawaii is an epic novel by James Michener that was turned into a (pretty good, you're not wrong) movie by cutting out the 80-90% of the story that wasn't about Abner and Jerusha. It covers the island from physical creation to (upon release) modern day following a dozen generations of a dozen families from a dozen origins. Personally I consider it Michener's best even better than The Source.
If you liked the movie Hawaii about the thin slice you're gonna go bugfuck for the whole pie
I read Hawaii in high school, but Michener’s patronizing treatment of Hale is one of the few things I remember now. Whatever the movie’s take, Michener clearly didn’t think Hale’s faith a virtue; in modern terms, it felt like a lot of 1950s literary sneering at the repressed, nerdy missionary.
Is the movie more nuanced in that regard, or does it just feel that way given the evolution of the culture war? Is my memory unfair to the novel?
You went to a great high school! Unless you meant you happened to read it around that age rather than have it assigned, which would be even cooler
I can't speak much to the movie, having only seen it once or twice and long ago. Having said that though, I've only read the book once or twice and long ago! Funny how some things you remember and some things you don't.
Anyway not to contradict your memory, but as far as I can tell Michener was a great lover of the mystique. He had no love for busybodies and tyrants and their factions. Abner is sometimes the (repressed, nerdy) personification of CS Lewis 'of all tyrannies the worst is the one who cares.' But he's also a man, one little lonely soul, who but for his rock solid faith in the Lord would be adrift like all the rest of us. That's one of the themes of the book - faith as necessary but sometimes dangerous. For example in Michener's narrative the Hawaiians originally left Polynesia because they were fed up with all-powerful Kahunas demanding human sacrifices at will - what they do to celebrate getting to Hawaii I will not spoil for those who haven't read.
One thing I do remember vividly from the movie was Abner force feeding Julie Andrews underripe bananas. It was in the book as well, but the people in charge of the movie really took the opportunity to make it a cinematic moment. Lost in the movie was the reason he was doing it - he was trying to acclimate Jerusha to what life would be like because he was deeply committed to the mission. Not that that justifies force feeding your wife underripe bananas - but that's a whole other layer - Abner didn't even know enough to know they were underripe! He was just clueless, stumbling around, and committed to his faith. The next layer is that when they get to Hawaii - it turns out women are forbidden from eating bananas because they're 'sacred!' So he made her sick (on top of the sea sickness) for months for no reason at all. That's obviously the behavior of a villain.
But Michener wrote Abner as a hero. After all, big swinging dick Captain Hoxworth didn't get the girl, Abner did. More seriously though despite adversity Abner learns to love and lives a full life to a ripe old age, finding fulfillment along the way. Classic hero 'man in the arena' stuff. This has all made me want to reread the book and I suppose I recommend the same to you. Great questions, thank you
I happened to read it at that age. Although it's not exactly history, it did put our brief coverage of Hawaii in my US history class to shame.
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Is it human sacrifices?
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Love Michener. I read Hawaii but still didn't recognize the main characters in the film review. It's about so much more.
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You know, I’d somehow never connected the MacArthur Park guy to the actor who’d end up playing Dumbledore. Not until I saw the face on this IMDB page.
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It's sometimes harder to ascertain just how realistic these movies are, or how unrealistic they are. Compared to more modern stuff, the noble savage is so obvious and transparent that one can easily wave them aside. But when the image presented is more pragmatist, realist, ambiguous... That's a lot more believable.
I think that believability is very obviously based on personal preference for 'pragmatism', 'realism' and nuance, as opposed to more in your face progressive ideological notes everyone has heard before. And I think taking the historical narrative seriously is usually an error, and just as fallacious as when a progressive starts mouthing off platitudes about 'hidden figures'. The fact it is more appealing makes it even more sinister.
These are stories from people. These people are not representing reality, they are representing themselves. The producers, writers, directors, actors. Just like modern cinema represents contemporary progressive values, the older movies represent the values of their time. To that end watching them is a good time and a very interesting looking glass into the past psychology of people, but with some caveats.
A part of me always feels that even being actively aware of the movie as the fiction it obviously is, it still taints your imagination and view of the world. Like reading a book, having your own vision on what everything looks like, then watching a movie based on the book and now all you can see when you read the book is the movie. Even worse when one thinks back, knowing this to have happened, and being unable to remember anything of what you originally imagined being.
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