Second Sunday Culture Film

Pili Ka Mo‘o; Standing Above the Clouds

Rainey Auditorium - Penn Museum

Sunday, Feb. 11, 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm ET

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Woman holding leaves in one hand. The back of her shirt reads

Indigenous activists everywhere are attempting to steer the world away from climate collapse. The films in this year’s series depict efforts to reclaim land in order to save all beings on the earth and for a more livable future.

Screenings are held in person in the Museum’s Rainey Auditorium.

Pili Ka Mo‘o
Dir. Justyn Ah Chong with Malia Akutagawa, 2022, 14 min.

Pili Ka Mo‘o follows the Fukumitsu ʻOhana, native Hawaiian taro farmers who live in Hakipuʻu, a traditional land district where ancestors once resided and their bones still remain. When Kualoa Ranch, the large foreign corporation that already owns 95% of Hakipu‘u, acquires and destroys more land that contains precious family burials, the Fukumitsus are tossed into a world of complex real estate and judicial proceedings.

Standing Above the Clouds
Dir. Jalena Keane-Lee, 2023, 15 min.

The peak of Maunakea, a shield volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii, is one of the world's most remote places. When the world's largest telescope is set to be built on the mountain’s peak, the development is met by a grassroots resistance movement led by Native Hawaiian mother- daughter activists, who stand to protect their sacred land.

Followed by remarks by filmmakers Justyn Ah Chong and Jalena Keane-Lee, and Rob Buscher, Lecturer, Asian American Studies Program, University of Pennsylvania.

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