During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class Maori household in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant the father, who returns from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his two elder sons who have drifted into gangland culture and crime, including his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son gets tattoos; another is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and pride. But back at the disordered home, 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, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and verve. He created a bold, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how he could bring this energy and talent to commercial projects.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he had another payday directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or maybe 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 worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a punchy, engaging film which avoided the usual double cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
