During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant debuts of that era, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a working-class indigenous household in South Auckland: the actor is the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male benefit recipient the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse 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 drifted into gangland culture and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son gets tattoos; the other is sent 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, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, directing them with assurance and energy. He created a bold, heartfelt film with a distinctly 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 that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he had another payday filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the installment derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
After this, the director discovered some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son the character and also his body double, employed to protect the heir from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped the usual double tropes. And in later years, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
