During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar Maori household in Auckland's south: the actor plays the drinking, brawling, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse his wife Beth, played 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 illegal activities, including his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son gets tattoos; the other is taken to a youth detention where he is at least tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and energy. He created a bold, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who could see how he could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
In America, the director made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he had another payday filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
After this, the director found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son Uday and also his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable movie which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
