As children, there’re all kinds of games available to entertain and to instill a little competition. The trick is that some of those games can end up with some players feeling a little left out, especially when the point of the game is to pick someone to be kicked out. These counting games go by several different names like Five Little Ducks (those poor lost duckies), Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, and, one that’s new to me, Inky Pinky Ponky. It’s here that co-writers Amanaki Prescott-Faletau (The Breaker Uppers) and Leki Bourke-Jackson begin their tale of an outsider experienced with being counted out and yet who tries, time and again, to be brought back in. Their script, once a play and now a feature, screened during imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival 2023 as the 60-minute film Inky Pinky Ponky, a high school dramedy coming-of-age tale with the magnetic Prescott-Faletau in the lead, directed by partners Damon Fepulea’I (Red, White & Brass) and Ramon TeWake. Especially as the laws in the United States are shifting to represent puritanical views, stories like Inky Pinky Ponky become even more important, reminding us that religious views often collide with cultural norms out of fear and control rather than leading with the love their proclaim.
After being kicked out of three other schools due to bullying, Lisa (Prescott-Faletau) prepares for her first day at a Catholic school, her mother’s last/best hope to get Lisa on the right path. It’s not that Lisa is a bad student or a trouble-maker, it’s that her mother (played by Sesilia Pusiaki), doesn’t see the woman Lisa is becoming, just the son she gave birth, too. At school, the rejection is basically the same, so Lisa prepares herself for the same embattled experience as she heads onto her new campus. While Lisa must endeavor to survive the usual bullying, more than one surprise occurs leading Lisa to find the support she’s longed for. But by crossing paths with the venomous and popular Sia (Bianca Seinafo-Tuilaepa), Lisa will need to stay on guard if she’s going to make her fourth school her last.
Amanaki Prescott-Faletau on the set of INKY PINKY PONKY. Photo courtesy of imagineNATIVE 2023.
In the official description on the imagineNATIVE website, the character of Lisa is described as a “young fakaleitī” with “3rd spirit” in parenthesis next to it. The word “fakaleitī” is Tongan, the language of the Polynesian island country Tonga, and is used to describe someone assigned male at birth who has a feminine gender expression. Similar to Samoa or Hawai’i, which have their own words for this type or “third gender” expression, the existence of an established word implies that someone who presents as a fakaleitī is certainly more welcome in those cultures than in the one in which this reviewer exists. All of this is worth mentioning because, there being a word for it doesn’t mean that those individuals who express themselves this way are inherently accepted. Impressively, the exploration and inclusion of what it means to be fakaleitī isn’t treated as novel or as a phase, but the honest expression of who Lisa is. We don’t join Lisa at any of the prior three schools, just this one, and she treats every interaction with grace and gentleness, though with an edge that does slice when utilized. This is a high school story, after all, and anything different is ripe for alienation and abuse; the presumed “rite of passage” that no student should experience but is the inevitable result of putting developing brains and bodies into close-quarters. Thus, Lisa battles being the new kid, being a fakaleitī, and then she accidentally steps into the path of a love-lorn mean girl, requiring the film to address all of this and end in a somewhat conclusory manner, which it all does without denying or reducing who Lisa is in the process.
Though the script does follow quite a bit of the expected path, it’s the execution that sets it apart. First, Lisa frequently breaks the fourth wall, talking to the audience directly about what’s going on internally. This requires that Prescott-Faletau shift from one physical expression to another and back seamlessly, moving from one powerful emotion to another without losing the rhythm of the scene. For modern U.S. audiences, this will likely spark some Fleabag (2016 – 2019) comparisons as the narrative tool in both is likely spillover from when they were each plays, though there’s no comparing Lisa to Fleabag as their characterizations are decidedly different. Unlike using narration as a short-cut, by having Lisa speak directly to the audience, we, the viewers, are positioned as confidant, the one person who Lisa can be her true self with as she lacks that in her regular life. We also are privy to her daydreaming (and regular dreaming), enabling us to understand Lisa’s desires and struggles, giving more weight to the interactions between the characters as they occur. Thankfully, Prescott-Faletau is a captivating performer, whether dreaming of victory or experiencing a living nightmare, there’s never a note of falsehood, of put-ons, or airs, with the way she presents Lisa, bringing life into each scene rather than vacuously depriving it of energy. Her’s is a star-making turn, giving a performance that makes it understandable why the story jumped from the stage to the silver screen. With her as the anchor, the film is able to dip its toes into the expected without losing any sense of authenticity and then do something surprising without feeling entirely out of bounds. This results in a cinematic experience wherein the audience wants more from this fictional world when the credits appear.
One aspect worth mentioning that’s a minor spoiler is that the location, the school itself, doesn’t become another obstacle to overcome, only the students within it. Via flashback, we get to see what it was like on a first day for Lisa and the ridicule that came from asking to be referred to by a different name than on the roster. We get to experience, with Lisa, how small and insignificant her teacher and peers made her feel via their rejection. The new school, however, reacts with love and support, something that seems antithetical to American views of a Catholic school, but does line-up with the words of Jesus who preached loving thy neighbor as you would yourself, rather than pushing them away. The characters of Lisa and her mother are presented as Tongan, which are presented here as heavily religious, so it’s a fascinating turn of events that this “last straw,” as it were, ends up being the exact refuge Lisa needed to build a foundation from which to grow in a healthy manner.
One thing to note is a tiny piece of inconsistency. The film’s imagineNATIVE page refers to Inky Pinky Ponky as a feature, the Coconet.TV refers to it as a feature, but other research implies (like its appearance on Maori+) is that it’s actually the first episode of a series. Now, we at EoM focus on film solely because there’s too much television to watch and it’s far easier to give an opinion on a work when it’s a completed work that merely a piece of a whole. That said, the editing, the performances, and the direction of Inky Pinky Ponky draw in the audience in such a way that we’re left wondering what happens next. Does this mean this *should* be a serialized program or a sequel? No. But one would shoot straight to the top of the list because nothing about this world comes off as fictional and is presented with all the complexity and varying perspectives that come from being a young adult trying to figure out their life while engaging with people who have too many of their own fears preventing them from doing the same.
Inky Pinky Ponky – I count you in, not out.
Screening during imagineNATIVE 2023.
For more information, head to the official imagineNATIVE 2023 Inky Pinky Ponky webpage.
Final Score: 4.5 out of 5.
This piece was written during the SAG-AFTRA strike. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike, the movie being covered here wouldn’t exist.
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Categories: In Theaters, Reviews, streaming
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