In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, fighting, boasting dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a writer. A son gets gang tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and energy. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how he could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
In America, Tamahori made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he had another payday directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring Uday and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: it was a forceful, engaging film which sidestepped typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, he returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
