In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: the actor is the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault his wife Beth, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. One son receives gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and verve. He created a bold, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how he could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
Stateside, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when the 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 decent suspense film, and he had another payday filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film 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. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
Following this, the director found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable film which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
