During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture 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 juvenile reformatory where he is at least tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and verve. He crafted a bold, sincere picture with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how he could bring that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of filming with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he earned again directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of his American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
After this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also Uday’s decoy double, used to protect the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging movie which avoided the usual doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
