During 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with his gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class indigenous household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, fighting, boasting alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his two elder sons who have drifted into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son receives tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and pride. But back at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with assurance and energy. He created a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to commercial projects.
American Films and Diverse Work
Stateside, the director directed the dark mystery 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 their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he earned again filming the sequel in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film 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 Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to remember where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
After this, the director found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring the character and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which avoided typical double cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
