ABSTRACT
More fully than other media, films convey the presence of music and dance. But like texts, transcriptions, and other edited realities, films play with illusion. Their appeal is partial. Fi l l ing two spatial dimensions and breaking the flow of time, they capture only pieces of the world they depict. G i v i n g structure to those pieces, they make a world of their own-an illusion that any depicted performers and savvy viewers, facing its immanent unreality, readily see through. Because films frame their subject, they temper what they picture. To tell their truth, they always lie. Hence, how the maker shapes the show is the crux of cinematic analysis (Heider 1976; Loizos 1993). Implications extend to questions of politics and power. W h o controls filmed representations of life in Oceania has emerged as an issue in current discourse on kastom, tradition, identity, and cultural construction (Hanson 1989; Linnekin 1992).
