In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class indigenous family in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son receives tattoos; another is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and verve. He crafted a bold, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers 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 journey through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film gained cult status when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, 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 perhaps the nadir, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? This car that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, Tamahori found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son Uday and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or kidnapping: this was a forceful, watchable movie which sidestepped typical double cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
