During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class indigenous family in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison is the boozing, fighting, bragging alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, including his gentle daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son gets gang tattoos; the other is taken 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 pride. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Raw Emotion and Confident Direction
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, 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 gutsy, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how he could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
In America, the director made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as two men who trek through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when its producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he had another payday filming the sequel in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
Following this, the director found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and also Uday’s decoy double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a punchy, engaging film which avoided typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, he went back to the subject of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
