During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar indigenous household in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their five children. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a writer. One son gets tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. But back at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and verve. He created a bold, sincere film with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry who could see how he could bring this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of filming with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he had another payday directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Career Shifts
Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of his American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? This car which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.
Later Work and Comeback
After this, the director discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as his body double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or kidnapping: this was a punchy, watchable film which avoided the usual doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
