The Remarkable True Story Behind BROKEN

A Murder, a Gospel and an Extraordinary Act of Forgiveness

BY: GOOD.

At the heart of BROKEN, now streaming on GOOD, is a story so extraordinary, it sounds as though it was written for the screen. A young girl is murdered. Her grieving father refuses to seek revenge. The man responsible takes something from his victim, only to discover that what he has stolen contains a message that will transform his own life. Eventually, murderer and father stand face to face, and forgiveness is asked for and given.

Yet the origins of this story stretch back almost two centuries, to Aotearoa New Zealand in 1836 and a young Māori girl named Tārore. Her story would become an important part of New Zealand’s Christian history and, generations later, provide the inspiration for the modern story told in BROKEN.

A Young Girl and Her Treasured Book

Tārore was the daughter of Ngākuku, a rangatira of Ngāti Hauā, and attended the mission school established near Matamata by missionaries Alfred and Charlotte Brown. There she learned to read and was given something particularly precious: an early te reo Māori translation of the Gospel of Luke.

Tārore treasured the small book, carrying it in a kete around her neck. She became accomplished at reading and remembering its words and shared passages with others in her community. Among the teachings she encountered were Christ’s messages of peace and forgiveness, words that would soon take on a significance no one could have imagined.

In October 1836, conflict in the region forced the mission school to evacuate from Matamata towards Tauranga. Tārore travelled with the group, carrying her Gospel with her, but they would never reach their destination together.

Tragedy at Wairere Falls

While the group camped near Wairere Falls in the Kaimai Range, they were attacked by a war party from Rotorua. Tārore was killed and the kete containing her treasured Gospel of Luke was taken.

For her father, the loss was unimaginable. In a culture in which utu could require a response to such a killing, Ngākuku faced a decision that could easily have resulted in further bloodshed. Yet at his daughter’s tangi, he urged his people not to seek revenge. The message of forgiveness his daughter had carried so close to her heart was now being lived out by the father grieving her death.

It was an extraordinary response, but the story was far from over. Tārore’s little book had begun a journey of its own.

The Gospel That Kept Travelling

The stolen Gospel eventually came into the hands of someone who could read it aloud. According to traditional accounts of the story, Paora Te Uita, identified as the warrior responsible for Tārore’s death, heard the words contained in the book that had been taken from her. The message affected him profoundly and he eventually sought out Ngākuku, knowing full well what approaching the father of the girl he had killed might mean. He came seeking forgiveness, and Ngākuku gave it.

Nearly two centuries later, it’s difficult to appreciate the enormity of that encounter. Ngākuku’s forgiveness wasn’t offered from a comfortable distance or after the pain had somehow disappeared. He was confronted by the man associated with his daughter’s death. He couldn’t undo what had happened or bring Tārore home, but he could decide whether her death would lead to another act of violence.

Instead of retaliation, there was reconciliation. The cycle stopped with him.

Perhaps even more remarkably, Tārore’s Gospel continued travelling through Māori communities. It eventually reached Ōtaki and became associated with the spread of Christianity further through the North Island and into the South Island. The story is part of a fascinating period in which Māori themselves became instrumental in carrying the Christian message between communities.

A little book carried around the neck of a young girl had travelled far beyond anything Tārore could possibly have imagined, and her story continued travelling with it.

From 1836 to BROKEN

BROKEN takes the heart of this historical story and transports it into a recognisably modern New Zealand world. Rather than attempting to recreate the events of 1836, the filmmakers ask what the same struggle between revenge and forgiveness might look like today.

The film places its characters amid contemporary gang violence. Logan is a former gang leader who has tried to leave that world behind and build a different future for his daughter, Tori. When she is killed, the world he thought he’d escaped comes rushing back, and Logan finds himself facing essentially the same choice that confronted Ngākuku almost two centuries earlier. Will one act of violence simply produce another, or can somebody find the courage to stop the cycle?

It’s a powerful way of retelling the story because so much has changed since Tārore’s time, yet the emotions at its centre haven’t. Grief still hurts. Anger still demands somewhere to go. Revenge can still feel like justice when somebody we love has been taken from us. And forgiveness can still seem almost impossible.

Forgiveness Doesn’t Make the Wrong Right

Perhaps that’s what makes the true story behind BROKEN so compelling. Forgiveness can sometimes be misunderstood as pretending something wasn’t wrong, forgetting what happened or allowing someone to escape responsibility for their actions. Tārore’s story suggests something much more difficult.

Ngākuku’s daughter was still dead. Forgiveness couldn’t change that reality or erase his grief. What it could change was what happened next. By refusing retaliation, he refused to allow his daughter’s murder to become the beginning of another killing, another grieving parent and another reason for revenge.

Then something happened that revenge could never have achieved. The man associated with Tārore’s death was himself changed. A story that had begun with violence eventually brought two men together in reconciliation.

There is something incredibly human in that, which is perhaps why the story has survived for almost two hundred years.

When Someone Decides the Hurt Stops Here

Most of us will hopefully never face a decision as devastating as the one faced by Tārore’s father, but the question behind his choice is surprisingly universal. What do we do with the hurt other people cause us?

Pain has a way of travelling. Someone hurts us, so we hurt someone else. Resentment moves through friendships and families, and sometimes through entire communities and generations. We may feel completely justified in holding onto it because what happened genuinely was wrong.

But every now and then, someone makes a different choice. They don’t deny what happened or pretend it didn’t matter; they simply decide they aren’t going to pass the hurt on.

That’s the thread connecting a young Māori girl in 1836 with a modern New Zealand film almost two centuries later. BROKEN may tell its story through fictional contemporary characters, but behind them stands an extraordinary piece of history: a murdered child, a grieving father, a stolen Gospel and a decision to forgive when revenge would have been completely understandable.

Tārore never lived to see where her little book travelled or the lives her story would eventually touch. What was taken from her became an instrument of reconciliation, and an act intended to produce loss became part of a story about peace.

Nearly two centuries later, her story is still being told.

BROKEN is now streaming on the GOOD app. Watch now: CLICK HERE.

Feature Image: Promotional Image from Broken