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In 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of that era, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a blue-collar indigenous household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, fighting, boasting dominant welfare claimant Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by the actress, and their kids. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and crime, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son receives gang tattoos; the other is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is assaulted by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”

Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking

Tamahori unleashed with such 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 gutsy, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who could see how he could bring this energy and flair to commercial projects.

Hollywood Career and Diverse Work

Stateside, the director made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who journey through wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer he wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of shooting with an animal actor in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent thriller, and he had another payday filming the second in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.

007 Movie and Career Shifts

Yet the peak, or perhaps the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this 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 which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.

Later Work and Return

After this, Tamahori found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a forceful, watchable film which avoided the usual doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.