During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son gets tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and gains self-worth and pride. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with confidence and verve. He created a gutsy, heartfelt film with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of filming with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he earned again filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? This car that makes it difficult to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
Following this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to shield the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, engaging film which avoided the usual double tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
