In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: the actor plays the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and energy. He created a gutsy, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry who could see how he could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
Stateside, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of the dictator's brutal offspring Uday and also his body double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable film which sidestepped the usual double tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
