Rewi's Last Stand / The Last Stand

Rudall Hayward made two movies inspired by the 1864 Battle of Ōrākau. The 1940 version, with sound, was later seen by a generation of Kiwi school kids. The film dramatises "a bloody, almost genocidal confrontation" (newspaper Te Iwi o Aotearoa) between colonial forces and an outnumbered group of Māori, led by Rewi Maniapoto. Hayward aimed for accuracy, and some characters were played by descendants of those who had fought. He added a romance featuring his future wife Ramai Te Miha, as a part-Māori woman who falls for a Pākehā. This fight scene is from the shorter The Last Stand, the only surviving version. 

The double-bill system, in which a main feature was shown following a cheaper feature of around an hour's length ... meant cutting the film to a little over half of its original length, reducing it from 112 to 64 minutes running time ... The Last Stand, as the British cut was entitled, did not do well there — and it is now all that remains of the film.

– Writer Annabel Cooper on Rudall Hayward shortening Rewi's Last Stand to get a British release, in 2018 book Filming the Colonial Past - The New Zealand Wars on Screen, page 72

Key Cast & Crew

Hilda Hayward

Editor

Ted (Edwin) Coubray

Associate Camera

Ramai Hayward

As: Ariana

Raureti Te Huia

As: Rewi Maniapoto

Leo Pilcher

As: Bob Beaumont

Rudall Hayward

Director, Writer, Editor, Camera