In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of that era, operating at full capacity with his gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar indigenous family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, played by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with such emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and verve. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with audiences and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could bring this energy and talent to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
In America, the director directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer he wrote amusingly 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 thriller, and he had another payday directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, the director found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as his body double, used to protect the heir from assassination or abduction: it was a punchy, watchable film which avoided typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
