During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant debuts of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor is the boozing, fighting, bragging dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his two elder sons who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka 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 “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike 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, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and verve. He created a gutsy, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how he could apply that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he earned again directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film 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 Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
After this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring Uday and as well as Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging film which avoided typical double cliches. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
