In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of that era, operating at full capacity with his gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, brawling, boasting alpha-male welfare claimant the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and energy. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could apply that dynamism and flair to commercial projects.
American Films and Diverse Work
Stateside, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of filming with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he had another payday directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the heir from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable film which sidestepped the usual doppelganger tropes. And in later years, he returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
