During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of that era, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class indigenous household in Auckland's south: the actor is the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault his wife Beth, played by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son receives tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the traditions of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and verve. He crafted a bold, heartfelt film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring this energy and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
Stateside, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he earned again directing the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to recall its parking spot.
Later Work and Comeback
Following this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or kidnapping: this was a forceful, watchable film which avoided the usual doppelganger tropes. And in later years, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. Tamahori was an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
