In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant debuts of the decade, operating at full capacity with his gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class indigenous family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, portrayed by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and energy. He created a bold, heartfelt film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how he could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, the director directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who journey through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer Art Linson 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 decent suspense film, and he earned again filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also his body double, employed to protect the heir from attack or abduction: it was a punchy, watchable film which avoided typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
