Whale Rider (2002)

Whale Rider is a  2002  New Zealand- German  family  drama film directed by  Niki Caro, based on the novel of the same name by  Witi Ihimaera. The film stars  Keisha Castle-Hughes as Kahu Paikea Apirana, a twelve-year-old  Māori girl whose ambition is to become the chief of the tribe. Her grandfather Koro believes that this is a role reserved for males only. The film was a coproduction between New Zealand and Germany. It was shot on location in  Whangara, the setting of the novel. The world premiere was on 9 September 2002, at the  Toronto International Film Festival. The film received critical acclaim upon its release. At age 13,  Keisha Castle-Hughes became the youngest nominee for the  Academy Award for Best Actress before she was surpassed by  Quvenzhané Wallis, at age 9, for  Beasts of the Southern Wild less than a decade later. The film earned $41.4 million <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-mojo_3-2" style="font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1;font-family:"HelveticaNeue",Helvetica,"NimbusSansL",Arial,"LiberationSans",sans-serif;font-size:0.75em;background-image:none;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-attachment:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;unicode-bidi:isolate;white-space:nowrap;color:rgb(34,34,34);">[3] <span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:"HelveticaNeue",Helvetica,"NimbusSansL",Arial,"LiberationSans",sans-serif;font-size:16px;"> on a  NZ$<span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:"HelveticaNeue",Helvetica,"NimbusSansL",Arial,"LiberationSans",sans-serif;font-size:16px;">9,235,000 budget.