The Pohutukawa Tree

This iconic Kiwi drama is the story of the last Māori family remaining on their iwi's lands in a town now completely populated by Pākehā. The rest of her iwi has been displaced or moved on, but the matriarch of the family, Aroha Mataira, is determined never to leave her ancestral home. As her children, Queenie and Johnny, grow up Aroha teaches them to believe in both the Māori-tanga and the Christian religion. Queenie meets a young Pākehā and falls in love and becomes pregnant. The young man refuses to marry her because she is Māori. Already dealing with the inner struggle of becoming a Māori man in a largely Pākehā world, his sister's dishonour sends him off the deep end. Will Ahoha be able to retain her cultural and spiritual identity and keep her family innocent in a rapidly changing and dangerous world?