During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class indigenous household in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, fighting, bragging alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. A son receives gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and gains self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but in contrast to you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and energy. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of filming with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he had another payday directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? This car that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
Following this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and as well as Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped the usual double tropes. In subsequent times, he went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
