The Kawelka Ongka's Big Moka

United Kingdom, 1988

Film
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Episode number 2 of Series “Disappearing world”.
In the West Highlands of Papua New Guinea there are many tribes. One of them is the Kawelka. The most prominent leader or ‘big man’ of the Kawelka tribe is called Ongka. For five years the Kawelka, driven on by Ongka, have been struggling to assemble a huge gift (a Moka) to give to a neighbouring tribe. For Ongka, assembling and giving this gift is more important than anything in his life. But when a big man dies suddenly in Ongka’s enemy tribe things start to go wrong.

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Collection

In ACMI's collection

Credits

director

Charles Nairn

production company

Granada Television International

Duration

00:52:00:00

Production places
United Kingdom
Production dates
1988

Appears in

Disappearing world

Group of items

Disappearing world

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Collection metadata

ACMI Identifier

302168

Language

English

Audience classification

G

Subject categories

Anthropology, Ethnology, Exploration & Travel → Papua New Guinea - Social life and customs

Documentary

Documentary → Documentary films - Great Britain

Short films

Short films → Short films - Great Britain

Sound/audio

Sound

Colour

Colour

Holdings

VHS; Access Print (Section 1)

Please note: this archive is an ongoing body of work. Sometimes the credit information (director, year etc) isn’t available so these fields may be left blank; we are progressively filling these in with further research.

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If you would like to cite this item, please use the following template: {{cite web |url=https://acmi.net.au/works/81102--the-kawelka-ongkas-big-moka/ |title=The Kawelka Ongka's Big Moka |author=Australian Centre for the Moving Image |access-date=2 July 2025 |publisher=Australian Centre for the Moving Image}}