In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, fighting, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his weak followers to terrorise and assault 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 fallen into gangland culture and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son gets tattoos; another is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. But back at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, 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 …”
Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and energy. He crafted a bold, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry 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 violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as two men who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of his American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring Uday and as well as his body double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: it was a punchy, watchable movie which sidestepped the usual doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an outstanding filmmaker – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
