During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar indigenous family in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison is 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 five children. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter Grace, who has talent as a writer. A son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and pride. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a very 90s touch 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 this energy and talent to commercial projects.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as characters who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly 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 had another payday directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. The 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, employed to shield the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable movie which avoided typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
