In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class indigenous household in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, brawling, bragging dominant welfare claimant Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who recognized how he could bring that dynamism and flair to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring the character and as well as Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: this was a punchy, watchable film which avoided the usual doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, he went back to the subject of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, working with writer 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.
