During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar Maori household in Auckland's south: the actor is the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and crime, including his gentle daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son receives tattoos; the other is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and verve. He crafted a bold, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced industry executives in the film industry who recognized how he could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
Stateside, the director made 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 Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly 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 filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of his American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; 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.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, the director found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of the dictator's brutal offspring Uday and also his body double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: it was a forceful, engaging film which sidestepped typical doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
