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C4- Meet the Natives

I met the Prince Philip Cult in Tanna last week. They didn't show me his portrait, but I recognised the village shown in the documentary. Also, I met the chief who I was told was 109 years old. He did look rather old. Not the same chief as in the programme I hasten to add. The chief system is very complicated with different chiefs and under-chiefs in the same community. Also, how they become chiefs varies from island to island.
 
Yeah I enjoyed this. I thought it was interesting and entertaining. The concept was just good enough to not be a gimmick.

It highlighted the massive fractionalisation that a dense industrial culture created compared to small island culture.
 
I saw it and thought it was good.

I cringed at the 'Do you eat your pets' in the trailer for the program but as stated above was taken out of context.
 
I enjoyed the programme. I thought the Prince Phil thing was some kind of wind-up until i read this thread though.
 
The really weird thing is that Price Philip has visited Tanna in secret and enjoyed allowing himself to be worshiped.

I'm not making this up, it's true and there are photos of him with the villagers receiving gifts. He got a penis sheath as a special present.

It's almost as weird as the Bush family and their giant owl thing. Even more weird possibly

really interesting article here, although they claim that the prince phil never really visited them, just sent them signed photos

http://www.news.vu/en/news/InternationalMediaCoverage/060618-Vanuatu-tourism-Jon-Frum.shtml

Personally I think that phill and his missus should be sent to Tanna without delay :cool:
 
Maybe to fulfill the prophecy Phil would have to be thrown into the vocano with his missus. You never know. These people from Tanna can be very guarded and don't tell other people the whole story.
 
Melinda said:
My only concern is that woman had a lovely warm friendly friendship with the visitors, and the promos were rather insulting to her. She lloked like an ignorant fuck in the promos, and she's not.
If I were her, Id feel betrayed by the production team, especially as I had opened my home and family to strangers and a film crew.
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Good point . I didn't see the trailers, but they sound out of order.
 
She did come across as a bit cringy at times during the programme. I strongly suspect that both people were given the bare minimum information to avoid inter-tribal conflict so that they had to find there own way to get to understand each other. These men from Tanna are a fiercesome bunch; the people from the other islands tend to be a bit wary about them. There was a riot a few months ago between the men from Tanna and those from another island called Ambryn, which was in all the papers (in Vanuatu). Anyway, I digress. As I said I reckon she was given minimal information and had to find her own way in relating to them, and when doing that mistakes will be made. Furthermore, I suspect that she found difficult being on camera because she did seem rather nervous. Good on her for doing it. I'm not sure that we would necessarily do a better job; we'd make different mistakes is all.
 
I think the one thing that would have improved the programme would have been if instead of 5 men from Tanna they had a mixed gender group. There were several times during the programme that the men commented on the role of women in English society and it would have been interesting to see what women from Tanna would have thought.

Though maybe that could be a second series; "Girls - Meet the Natives."
 
Here's the chief and the photos sent to him by God (who is holding the spear the chief sent as a gift)
1531937-The-Prince-1.jpg
1531933-The-Chief-3.jpg
 
The trailor for the next one has a visitor saying "You have people who are homeless????!:confused::confused:"

Should be another good one :)
 
Melinda said:
I really think the style of promotion and even the title are uneccesarily provocative. Its the antithesis of the content of the show. Shitty.
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I agree the trailer was a bit misleading, but I thought the title was quite a clever play on peoples perceptions - surely the British people are 'the natives'?

Am looking forward to tonight - I was pleasantly surprised by last weeks episode. :cool:
 
lizardqueen said:
Am looking forward to tonight - I was pleasantly surprised by last weeks episode. :cool:
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Is it tonight? I thought it was on Thursday last week.
 
if anyone's missing a bit of accessible pop-anthropological musing tonight they could do worse than check out this programme on More 4 at 10pm tonight

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0493420/

I've heard that it's really good

I'm going to start another thread just to let people know but I think that the people who like this would like it too
 
I am coming a bit late to this I guess but it looks like a very interesting idea.

It's only just started but I already want to see more of their home movies rather than the set ups.
 
Louloubelle said:
Just brilliant!

We are looking forward to trying the traditional welcoming drink

Vimto

:D
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I don't like the piss take bits like that. It reveals that the real reason they came up with this programme was much less well intentioned and more to do with someone saying 'hey lets make the REAL borat'.
 
ATOMIC SUPLEX said:
I don't like the piss take bits like that. It reveals that the real reason they came up with this programme was much less well intentioned and more to do with someone saying 'hey lets make the REAL borat'.
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I disagree

they are being earnest and respectful towards their host and the fact is that for this family Vimto is the traditional welcoming drink, just as much as passing round cigarettes is their traditional welcoming ritual. On one level I didn't like seeing the guests drinking Vimto and smoking fags as they are poison (IMO) however the whole point is for them to sample what's on offer and they seem to be quite discerning about everything and to have some considered opinions I agree with 100%. For example they are deeply concerned that the English care more about animals than they do about people, which is a concern I share.
 
The fact is that they have some very sharp and valid perspectives about how we live and I was in tears when the chief made his speech about homelessness.

I feel bad for them about the prince Philip thing though. That bit isn't going to have a happy ending.
 
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