During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. One son receives gang tattoos; the other is taken to a youth detention where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains self-worth and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
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 verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how he could bring this energy and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film 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 earned again filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? This car that makes it difficult to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son the character and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable film which avoided the usual double tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. He proved to be an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
