During 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. This family are a working-class Maori household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, brawling, bragging dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault his wife Beth, played by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a gutsy, sincere film with a very 90s touch of edginess. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who recognized how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he had another payday filming the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the heir from assassination or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging movie which avoided typical doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, he went back to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
