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In 1994, the director Lee Tamahori made one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family are a working-class indigenous household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the boozing, brawling, bragging dominant welfare claimant the father, who comes home from pub visits with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. A son gets gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and learns self-worth and pride. But back at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were individuals with honor, pride; soulful beings …”

Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking

Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, domestic moments and gang initiation rituals, handling them with confidence and verve. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed industry executives in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to commercial projects.

American Films and Varied Projects

In America, Tamahori made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore protocol, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as characters who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when the producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he had another payday directing the sequel in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.

Bond Film 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; it was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.

Later Work and Comeback

After this, Tamahori found some more interesting form. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring Uday and as well as his body double, employed to protect the heir from assassination or abduction: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped typical doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori went back to the theme of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding filmmaker – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.