During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar indigenous family in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. A son gets gang tattoos; the other is taken to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the ways of Maori culture – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring this energy and talent to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production 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 filming the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the worst gadget in the series – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
After this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and also his body double, used to shield the heir from assassination or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable movie which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding filmmaker – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
