Once Were Warriors Trivia

1. The head of the Heke family is Jake. What is his nickname among his drinking buddies?

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: The Muss

Jake is a violent alcoholic, and his brute strength and size mean he wins every fight he picks. He is known as "The Muss", shortened from "Muscles". Unfortunately, as well as beating up grown men, Jake also vents his violence on his wife and five children, subjecting them to physical and verbal abuse on an almost daily basis. In "Once Were Warriors" (1994) and its 1999 sequel "What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?", Jake was played by Maori actor Temuera Morrison.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Ice cream

Jake orders milkshakes for Nig and his gang mates when they come to the pub.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Eighteen Years

Jake and Beth have been married for eighteen years as the story opens. They have five children and live in a run down "state house" (social housing) in a slum area. Beth's parents never liked or approved of Jake, and opposed her marriage to him, leaving her isolated and vulnerable to his drunken outbursts. Jake is unemployed and an alcoholic, and makes the lives of Beth and their children miserable.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Their own home

In this scene Beth and Jake switch abruptly from hugging and kissing to arguing, which is emblematic of their relationship. Although Jake presents losing his job as good news, Beth disagrees. When she raises the issue of saving for a house Jake replies, "We got a house, and the government ain't gonna kick us out. The rent's cheap." Beth insists that she wants the family to have their own house, but Jake tells her to forget about it. As well as revealing a great deal about the relationship between Jake and Beth, this scene includes an exchange between Jake and his oldest son Nig which alerts us to the deep smouldering anger between them.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: A headbutt

This is the start to probably the best fight scene ever. Jake, played by Temuera Morrison ends up belting the lights out of the big thug.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Auckland

In the original 1990 book upon which the film is based, the town where the Hekes live is named Two Rivers. Author Alan Duff named it for his own real hometown of Rotorua, which translates from the Maori into English as "Two Rivers". For the 1994 film, the setting was changed to Auckland.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: "Was that before or after you picked him up?"

Beth's reply and the attitude she takes towards the police throughout this scene are indicative not only of the hostility she feels towards the police, but also of her desire to protect her children. In particular, this is true of Boogey; as we hear her say in a later scene, she doesn't think Boogey is strong like the others.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: His father is there.

Beth tells Nig there's plenty of booze and food, but Nig objects to staying home because of his father. Although Beth understands the fraught relationship between Jake and Nig, the discussion between her and Nig quickly escalates into an argument and she slaps him. Nig's growing sense of alienation from his family is clear. He storms off and we assume that he joins members of the gang into which we subsequently see him being inducted. His induction requires that he take a fairly brutal beating from the gang members, after which he is told, "Now you can meet your new family."

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: A poofter

When he walks up the stairs one of the other boys says "There goes Nig Heke's brother, looks like a poofter to me bro". Boogie is played by Taungaroa Emile.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Mark

Mark, or Boogie as he is known, is the second son of Jake and Beth Heke. During the course of the story he is made a ward of the State by the New Zealand authorities and placed in a children's home. Beth is heartbroken and misses him immensely, but Jake barely seems to care at all. In the end, the home turns out to be a better place than home for Boogie, as the manager is very kind and takes him under his wing, helping him discover and embrace his Maori heritage.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Her face is bruised and swollen because Jake beat her up.

Distressed by her argument with Nig, Beth stands up to Jake when he tells her to cook more food for the guests, and Jake flies off the handle. He beats her savagely in what is a truly stomach-turning depiction of domestic violence. Although Beth had promised Boogey she would accompany him, her face is such a mess that she knows that her appearance would work against Boogey in court. Unfortunately, the court places Boogey in the custody of social welfare.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Go clean herself up.

His exact phrase is "Woman you look awful, go clean yourself up".

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: He gets a tattoo

Nig is desperately searching for some form of the "belonging" and caring that is so badly lacking in his home life. He joins a Maori gang and gets a traditional "Ta moko" facial tattoo. These tattoos display someone's lineage and heritage, and by only getting his on one side of his face, to show his mother's side, Nig makes a highly visible statement about his (non)relationship with his father.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Jake gets drunk and won't give Beth the keys.

Although Jake has a win on the horses and comes up with the money to hire a car, they never make it to see Boogey. The family spends the day driving around and have a fabulous time - a rare occurrence for the Heke family. Things start going wrong when Jake visits the pub for 'just one beer'. Predictably, one turns into an afternoon of drinking. Beth tries, unsuccessfully to get the keys off Jake so that the rest of the family can go without him, but in the end they get a taxi home, leaving Jake at the pub. In the evening, Beth rings Boogey to apologise and protects him from the truth by telling him that they had a car accident.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: "Keep your mouth shut and your legs open."

Best one liner of the movie, and there were many. This quote was made the morning after Jake had his fight with Beth. Mavis was just trying to cheer Beth up.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: She hangs herself

Grace is attacked and raped by one of her father's drinking buddies, "Uncle Bully", and is so traumatised that she hangs herself from a tree in the garden at home. She is just thirteen years old. In the 1994 film, it is made clear that "Uncle Bully" is her attacker, but in the original 1990 book by Alan Duff, Grace thinks it was actually Jake, and Jake was so drunk that he can't even remember if it was him or not.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: He had raped her.

At an earlier party we see Grace obey the instruction to give Uncle Bully a kiss and later that night he comes into her bedroom and rapes her. Although she doesn't tell anyone about this, her mother notices a dramatic change in her daughter's behaviour. Following the rape, Grace absolutely refuses to kiss Uncle Bully and Jake becomes furious. He throws Grace to the floor and rips up the exercise book in which she writes stories.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Cliff Curtis

Before portraying drunken rapist Bully in "Once Were Warriors", Cliff Curtis had also appeared in a small role in "The Piano" in 1993. "The Piano" was the most sucessful New Zealand made film of all time until it was surpassed at the box office by the unexpected popularity and critical acclaim of "Once Were Warriors". Curtis has also appeared in many other films over the years including "Three Kings" (1999) and "The Last Airbender" (2010).

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: She wrote it down in her book of stories.

Almost every time we see Grace during the film she has an exercise book in her hands, and we hear a few of the stories she writes in it. The family consider her writing her special gift and it is certainly her escape. Although most of the stories in the book are fictitious, she also writes about her rape at the hand of Uncle Bully. After the funeral, Beth is mending the book that Jake had torn up earlier in the film, and she finds Grace's account of the rape.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: "Maybe 'cos we're all bloody Maoris."

Another great one liner from a movie with many. Grace, played by Mamaengaroa Kerr-Bell, has good on screen chemistry with Toot(Shannon Williams).

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Toot

Toot attends Grace's funeral and is heartbroken as he blames himself for her suicide. At this point, none of the Hekes know that Grace had been molested by one of her father's drunken friends, but she had confided in Toot after it happened. He had kissed her, in a misguided attempt to offer comfort, and she had become very upset, run away from him, and hung herself in the garden of her home. At the funeral he tells Grace how much she meant to him and how she was his best friend, and Boogie says that he knows that Grace loved Toot too. Beth then invites Toot to leave the abandoned car in which he lives, and move in with her and her remaining children.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Beth reads Grace's journal

Grace had been in the habit of keeping a journal, and she detailed what happened the night Bully attacked her. After the funeral, when Beth finds and reads it, she goes to the bar where Jake and Bully are drinking and shows Jake what she has found. Jake then attacks Bully, and beats him up in a very violent scene, culminating in Bully being stabbed with a broken bottle. The discovery of what drove her daughter to take her own life is the final straw for Beth and she tells Jake she is leaving him, and the city, and taking the children back to her parents Maori homeland. Jake is left alone, sitting on the kerb outside the bar as the film ends. Beth was played by award winning actress Rena Owen, and she reprised the role for the 1999 sequel "What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?" too. She has also appeared in several of the "Star Wars" films directed by George Lucas, and lent her voice talents to two of the franchised video games as well.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: Beth

In this powerful closing speech Beth says, "Our people, once were warriors, but not like you Jake, they were people with mana, pride, people with spirit. If my spirit can survive living with you for eighteen years, then I can survive anything. Maybe you taught me that." She then gets into the car with her children, Jake hurling abuse at her. In this final moment we see the strength of Beth as she takes her children 'home' (back to her people's ancestral land), leaving Jake a frustrated, angry, and ultimately lonely, man.

From Quiz Once Were Warriors

Answer: "I wanna feed."

The movie itself has very little sexual matter but this comment is very funny.

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