In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor is the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and abuse his wife Beth, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent 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 storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; another is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and verve. He created a bold, heartfelt film with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when its producer he wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir 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
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of his Hollywood career was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, viewers asked? This car that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
After this, the director discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son the character and also his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: it was a punchy, watchable movie which avoided the usual doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
