In 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class indigenous household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, brawling, boasting alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. A son gets tattoos; another is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and energy. He crafted a bold, heartfelt film with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring this energy and flair to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of filming with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he had another payday directing the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of his American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in the series – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? This car that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
Following this, Tamahori found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son the character and as well as his body double, employed to shield the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped typical double cliches. And in later years, he returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
