During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar indigenous household in South Auckland: the actor plays the drinking, fighting, bragging dominant welfare claimant the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. A son receives tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and energy. He created a gutsy, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how he could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as two men who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of filming with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he had another payday filming the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped typical double cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
