During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, boasting alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who has talent as a storyteller. One son receives tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is at least tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and energy. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as characters who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of filming with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again directing the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and as well as his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, engaging movie which avoided the usual double cliches. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
