During 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant debuts of the decade, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar indigenous family in Auckland's south: the actor is the boozing, fighting, boasting dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son gets tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip 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 energy. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could apply that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Varied Projects
Stateside, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of filming with an animal actor in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent 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 perhaps the low point, of his Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it.
Subsequent Projects and Return
Following this, the director found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son Uday and also his body double, used to protect the heir from assassination or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable movie which sidestepped typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, he returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
