During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a working-class indigenous family in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a storyteller. A son gets gang tattoos; another 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 gains dignity and pride. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, directing them with assurance and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who trek through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of filming with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he earned again directing the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career 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 remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and as well as his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: this was a forceful, engaging movie which avoided the usual doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
