During 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching social-realist melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a blue-collar Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to intimidate and assault Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their five children. He shows no concern to the fate of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a storyteller. One son gets tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to 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 bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and energy. He created a bold, heartfelt picture with a very 90s touch of edginess. It succeeded with audiences and critics, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could bring this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who trek through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when the producer Art Linson wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again filming the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
007 Movie and Career Shifts
But the high point, or perhaps the low point, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
Following this, the director discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's hideous son the character and as well as his body double, employed to shield the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: this was a forceful, engaging movie which sidestepped typical double cliches. And in later years, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
