In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: the actor is the drinking, fighting, boasting dominant welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son receives tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is at least tutored in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and verve. He created a gutsy, sincere picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how he could bring that dynamism and talent to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Diverse Work
Stateside, the director directed the noir thriller 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 characters who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its producer he wrote amusingly about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he earned again 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 Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Comeback
Following this, the director found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, watchable movie which sidestepped the usual double cliches. And in later years, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
