During 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar Maori household in South Auckland: the actor is the drinking, brawling, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, including his gentle daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son receives tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and pride. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with audiences and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status 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 filming the sequel in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as his body double, used to shield the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped the usual double tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
