During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori household in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. A son receives gang tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with assurance and energy. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the turbulent production of filming with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he earned again filming the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in the series – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, the director discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring the character and also his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a forceful, watchable movie which avoided the usual doppelganger tropes. And in later years, he returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
