In 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class indigenous family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, fighting, bragging dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who has talent as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. 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 that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer he wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he had another payday directing the sequel in the triple-X franchise 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 the star; this was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following this, the director found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to shield the heir from assassination or abduction: it was a punchy, engaging film which avoided the usual double tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the subject of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
