In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar indigenous household in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse his wife Beth, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and crime, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is at least educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such intense drama, 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 bold, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops 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 he wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of filming with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he had another payday directing the sequel 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 Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following 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 Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the heir from attack or kidnapping: this was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped typical double cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
