Born in Papeete, Paul Aivanaa Manate lived his entire childhood in Arue and then in PK9, in Mahina, with his three brothers and sisters. His father is a metropolitan and his mother is Tahitian from Rurutu.

At the beginning of the 80's, the family moved to mainland Tahiti, but Paul returned regularly to his native country to see his friends, his aunts and uncles, his many cousins, his parents living in Rurutu... With each visit, he replenishes his resources and gradually feeds his imagination, drawing inspiration and material for his future films from the landscapes, personalities and culture of Tahiti.

It was in France that his desire to make films became a reality. He obtained a DEA in cinema at the Sorbonne, worked for Canal + as a script consultant and began to write stories that always had a link with his mixed race origins and the Polynesian soul that he was so passionate about and that he tried to capture.

In 1995, he directed his first documentary, Des pirogues et des hommes, about the Va'a club in Faa and the Heiva races. In 1998, he shot a short film, Ina, inspired by the character of his Kanak half-sister, and in 2008, he directed Mes quatre morts, which tells the story of a Tahitian who arrives in Brest for an internship. Finally, in 2013, he shot Nevermore in Tahiti about the return of a "half" legionnaire to the fenua... Today, with the feature film L'Oiseau de paradis, Paul continues his cinematographic work on the richness and complexity of the Polynesian identity.