During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest debuts of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, brawling, boasting alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub 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 illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. A 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 taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a bold, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. 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 this energy and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? This car that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori discovered 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 Uday’s decoy double, employed to shield the heir from attack or kidnapping: this was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped the usual doppelganger cliches. And in later years, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
