Lee Tamahori's First Film Once Were Warriors Revealed a Filmmaker of Guts and Flair
During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: the actor plays the boozing, fighting, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by the actress, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son gets gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but in contrast to you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and energy. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of filming with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he had another payday filming the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
After this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the heir from attack or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable movie which sidestepped typical double tropes. And in later years, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
