Lee Tamahori's First Film Once Were Warriors Showcased a Director of Courage and Style

In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest debuts of that era, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. This family are a working-class Maori family in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison is the boozing, fighting, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse his wife Beth, played by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and crime, as well as his gentle daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son gets tattoos; another is sent 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 gains self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”

Emotional Violence and Confident Direction

Tamahori let rip with such 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 gutsy, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who could see how Tamahori could bring this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.

Hollywood Career and Varied Projects

In America, the director directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie 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 filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.

007 Movie and Career Shifts

But the high point, or maybe the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need such a car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember its parking spot.

Later Work and Comeback

Following this, the director discovered renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, engaging film which sidestepped typical doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.