Offensive.

Rating: 1/10 (27 November 2013)

I wanted to enjoy this movie, but the 1849 scenario set in the "Pacific Islands" (Huh? Which ones?) depicts African slaves working on a plantation under brutal subjugation by English overlords. It turns out the "African slaves" are actually supposed to be Maori who, if you don't know (as the supremely ignorant filmmakers clearly didn't), are not Africans but rather Polynesians (Pacific Islanders) and were certainly not enslaved as depicted in this movie. And I don't care if this is based on a work of fiction because it was surely the filmmaker's (and not the author's) choice to cast African actors into Pacific Islander "Maori" roles. And don't tell me there weren't any Pacific Islanders or actors who at least look Polynesian.
So it's not surprising that they are vague about the exact location of these islands, which gives this particular story a broad-brushed, white-man-enslaving-generic-dark-men, so who cares if its complete b.s? feel. It took me completely out of the movie. There were never African slaves on a Pacific Island who were called Maori and who were forced under whip to work on plantations. This movie is so DUMB! I hate that it only adds to the general level of ignorance, and disrespects the very existence and identity of Polynesians and Pacific Islanders. WE are NOT Africans-not that there's anything wrong with that. And we deserve to be portrayed as ourselves, and not as Africans.
In this day and age, there is no excuse for the level of ignorance perpetuated by the filmmakers in their portrayal of this slice of "history," fiction or not! I'm sure this movie has already made a lot of money, but it deserves to fail.