During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar indigenous household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, brawling, boasting alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, played 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, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains self-worth and self-respect. But back at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who recognized how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
Stateside, Tamahori directed the dark mystery 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 trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson 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 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 nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
After this, the director found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to shield the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a forceful, watchable film which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
