NIU FOREVER w/ WHAT WE CALL HOME

Across the Pacific, the coconut, or niu, has sustained generations as food, medicine, material, and cultural touchstone. Yet in modern Hawai‘i, many coconut palms have been reduced to ornamentation, their deeper significance and potential increasingly forgotten. NIU FOREVER follows the remarkable friendship between a Sri Lankan knowledge keeper and a Hawaiian cultural practitioner whose shared passion sparks a movement to return edible coconuts to Hawai‘i’s landscape and restore niu as the Pacific’s “Tree of Life.” As their community confronts generations of misunderstanding alongside the growing threat of a destructive invasive species, the effort to restore niu becomes about far more than a single plant. Drawing upon thousands of years of Indigenous knowledge, NIU FOREVER connects cultural revitalization with urgent questions of food sovereignty, environmental stewardship, and climate resilience. Rooted in friendship and collective action, this inspiring documentary reveals how ancestral knowledge can provide a pathway forward, reconnecting Hawai‘i’s communities to the land, their traditions, and a more sustainable future. Plays With: WHAT WE CALL HOME On the outskirts of paradise, a family in a self-governed, houseless community search for the meaning of home amidst government removal of their land.