During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a blue-collar Maori household in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, boasting dominant welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. A son gets tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with confidence and energy. He crafted a gutsy, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair 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 a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its producer he wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances 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 triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the installment derided for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? This car that makes it difficult to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
After this, the director discovered some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped the usual doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
