During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class indigenous household in Auckland's south: the actor is the boozing, brawling, boasting alpha-male welfare claimant the father, who comes home from pub visits with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, played by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the future of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and pride. But back at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and energy. He crafted a bold, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who recognized how he could bring this energy and flair to commercial projects.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of filming 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 triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a forceful, watchable film which avoided the usual doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
