During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest debuts of the decade, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a blue-collar indigenous family in South Auckland: the actor is the drinking, brawling, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have drifted into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son receives tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns dignity and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and energy. He crafted a bold, sincere film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced industry executives in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (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 decent suspense film, and he earned again directing 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 American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring the character and as well as his body double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it was his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
