In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant debuts of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar Maori household in South Auckland: the actor plays the drinking, brawling, bragging dominant welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son receives tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and pride. But back at the disordered home, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but in contrast to you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a bold, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as characters who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film 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 decent thriller, and he had another payday directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of his American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? This car that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also his body double, used to protect the heir from assassination or abduction: this was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped typical doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
