In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest debuts of the decade, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, brawling, boasting alpha-male benefit recipient the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault his wife Beth, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. One son gets tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and energy. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with audiences and critics, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could bring this energy and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of filming with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he had another payday filming the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
After this, the director found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also his body double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a forceful, watchable movie which avoided the usual double cliches. And in later years, he went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
