Talk us through itThe Williams family have moved into their newly built home in middle class suburbia. Unfortunately for our picture postcard family the bricks used in their house's construction come from a beach where Te Tako and his warriors were defeated in pre-colonial times. Worse yet Te Tako was executed and his betrothed committed suicide due to her lost and her father being the executioner. Is that Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells" playing in the background? Strange things start happening with daughter Nicky having visions of the past and son Caleb having an imaginary friend named George who wants stuff like hearts and the like. As things escalate and Mom hides the pea soup, it's surprisingly up to Nicky to get the Williams family out of the hangi pit. An altogether excellent episode ensues. Ready to hit The Exorcist kiwi style?
Review"My god his voice! What was that?" - Mary WilliamsEvery now and again you hit a television show that simply screams out "translate this to the big screen stat"! The Sands of Time was excellence on a stick and is strong enough to translate to a feature length movie. Mr Carter I am prepared to support that idea in any court in the land. Wow what a way to finish the DVD box set of Mataku and it's got to be said I'm sweating on any sort of a release for season three now. Don't leave us hanging TV3! Final lesson time: In New Zealand the Maori consider a lot of places tabu, that would be sacred to the local Iwi. Generally these are areas where great events have taken place, major battles etc, and where the bones and flesh of past generations are buried. Naturally this includes beaches and the like as well as hinterland locations. Modern companies have been happily mining beaches for sand without realising that in some cases they are desecrating Maori spiritual land. There have been a number of documented cases where modern brick homes have been "haunted" without an explanation as to why. The Maori believe that there's a story in the land, old spirits are locked in the land, and if disturbed will come through the building blocks of your house. Moral of the story is be careful where you get your building bricks from. Director Carter rocks the house down with his prologue piece to the episode. A Maori chief is on a hill top surveying the scene of a major battle below on a beach. Ranks of Warriors are on the sand clearly victorious after a major victory. As the Chief descends we get one hell of a haka going down with blood splattered individuals ripping into it with more ferocity than an All Black forward pack about to face the Bokke. Did they give the extras angry pills or something? An epic opening gambit to Sands of Time, can Carter keep this rocking through the rest of the episode? I was still reeling from the opening scene when Carter hit me with a right hook via the slow tension filled build, before he dropped me to the canvas with some Exorcist like action. Got to answer in the affirmative there, Carter has this one by the scruff of the neck and isn't about to let go. Okay so in the plot outline I hit a couple of references to The Exorcist, and Carey Carter clearly has that movie in the back of his mind as he ramps up the tension and scare factor as the Williams start to realise something is wrong in the state of suburbia. Just like in The Exorcist we have the gradual seeping in of the chaotic to the normal, to use a Stephen King analogy. Nicky is starting to have visions of the pass and Caleb has a supposed imaginary friend named George, who is quite demanding. The only ingredients missing here are a Ouija board, rats in the attic, and a book on black magic. Well if you wanted to be picky a desecrated Catholic church or two would probably have rounded out the festivities. As Carter brings things to the boil nicely, that POV out of Caleb's window as he and his father drive off was excellent, the foundations that Carter has been carefully constructing hold up in the face of a full on supernatural tsunami. We're talking unseen forces, teens speaking in deep gruff voices, and levitation going down. If Carter had ripped into a bit of head spinning and pea soup action I would have been giving him a virtual high five. It all comes home to roost nicely with developments never quite getting out of the audience's believability zone. Carter nails this part of the movie and I was having a jamboree of fun as things went down. 
Special mention of the scene where the copper brings Caleb back late at night, apparently he was caught with a nefarious plan for a dead cat. Caleb is sitting at one end of the table while his mom, dad, and the policeman are standing at the other. To further reinforce things Director Carter goes with a long slightly angled down shot highlighting that Caleb is on his own, vulnerable, and a pretty small unit. Excellent stuff and a money shot for the ages. Unfortunately the ending doesn't quite match what I was hoping for, but in terms of Mataku was probably the correct way to go. We get a touch of Maori belief resolving things in the face of pakeha scepticism. Without going into too much detail, and hence hitting the spoiler freeway to non-watch city, lovers are re-united and the there's got to be a morning after. Damn I was hoping for Priests crashing out of windows, a locust plague, you know the usual demonic movie stuff. In the wash-up writers Robert Rakete and Darren Young get things about right, with the prologue resolving itself via flashback and the resolution. Once were demons are now star crossed lovers and we have a Disney ending to keep all members of the audience happy with life. Well except those of us wanting an exorcism and some supernatural mean spiritness to go down. Gosh I hate it when writers deprive us of the good gravy part of the meal but still manage to round things out with meat and three veg. Rawiri Paratene (David Williams) doesn't get to do much besides talk in either a loud voice or a quiet voice as the scene demands, which is just as well as I didn't notice a whole lot happening facial expression wise. Maggie Harper (Mary Williams) hands in a typical pakeha performance and sort of has things covered. Dominique Crawford (Nicky Williams) thankfully has something going for the home team, and Jacob Rutene (Caleb Williams) goes at it all bright eyed and innocent. Hirini Melbourne and Kipa Royal hit the traditional Maori instruments with some help from Richard Nunns. Effective when used, especially in the opening scene. Kipa Royal and Franck Marinthe provided the score, which I unfortunately didn't take much notice of as I was waiting for the first Priest to hit the driveway. We also get something called "Kia Tupato" by Iwi that I could have down without and I was left vaguely wondering why it was included. Got the reference but the song didn't fit the movie.
Summary ExecutionWell I certainly had a hoot with Sands of Time and dug what Director Carter and Co had going down. You don't tend to get this much fun out of anything apart from a Sunday session involving tequila to be honest at the best of times. Well constructed episode that had me rocking along to the very end.Guess since this is the last episode review till some muppet works out to release season three we should finish off with a few thoughts on the technical side of things. Each episode runs for around thirty minutes, surprising what they can fit into that time frame, and is independent of the other episodes. The DVDs are worth the investment in and of themselves, each episode has an introduction from Temuera Morrison, and we get a post episode chat from the Producers. Included are some stills action and a Maori glossary for us Pakehas, you pretty much have the well rounded product. Full recommendation on Sands of Time, one of the best episodes I've seen thus far in the Mataku franchise. Even if the rest of the first two seasons don't appeal to you then I would urge you to hunt out this one episode to see what the Critics are raving about Down Under. Well okay that might be what I'm raving about, but hell who you going to call on your viewing options? Don't let the sands run out, take some time to catch a screening of Sands of Time.
ScaryMinds Rates this episode as ... If people want to change channels when this bad boy comes on then toss them out the window!
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