In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class indigenous family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, fighting, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home 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 future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a writer. One son gets gang tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and self-respect. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our ancestors once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and energy. He crafted a bold, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how he could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer he wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again filming the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of his Hollywood career was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment mocked for having the worst gadget in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.
After this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and also his body double, used to protect the heir from attack or kidnapping: this was a forceful, engaging movie which sidestepped the usual double tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
Maya Chen is a freelance writer and urban enthusiast with a passion for documenting city life and cultural shifts.
