The Director's Debut Once Were Warriors Revealed a Filmmaker of Courage and Style
In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant debuts of the decade, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar indigenous household in South Auckland: the actor is the boozing, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient the father, who returns from drinking in the pub 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 gang life and crime, including his sensitive daughter Grace, who shows promise as a storyteller. A son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly tutored in the traditions of Maori culture – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”
Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking
Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, directing them with confidence and energy. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a very 90s streak of edginess. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.
American Films and Varied Projects
Stateside, 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 Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as characters who journey through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This moderate movie became a cult favorite when the producer he wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of filming 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 directing the second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the low point, of his American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film derided for having the worst gadget in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.
Later Work and Return
After this, Tamahori discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring Uday and as well as his body double, employed to shield the heir from assassination or abduction: it was a forceful, engaging movie which sidestepped typical double tropes. In subsequent times, Tamahori went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, making The Convert in 2023, working with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter his partner. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.
