The Director's First Film Once Were Warriors Showcased a Director of Courage and Style
In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault his wife Beth, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns dignity and self-respect. But back at the disordered home, Grace is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and verve. He crafted a bold, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry who recognized how he could apply 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 procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he earned again filming the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Return
After this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son the character and also his body double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or abduction: it was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped the usual doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
