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During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the most significant first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a working-class Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor plays the boozing, brawling, bragging dominant welfare claimant the father, who returns from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his two elder sons who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. A son gets gang tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory where he is partly tutored in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the traditional weapon – and learns dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were individuals with honor, dignity; soulful beings …”

Raw Emotion and Confident Direction

Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with assurance and energy. He created a bold, sincere picture with a distinctly 90s streak of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – for good or ill – deeply impressed studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could apply this energy and flair to commercial projects.

Hollywood Career and Diverse Work

Stateside, Tamahori directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as two men who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its 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 thriller, 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 maybe the low point, of his American work was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. What is the point such a car, audiences wondered? This car which makes it very hard to remember where you parked it.

Subsequent Projects and Return

Following this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s brutal offspring the character and as well as his body double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from assassination or abduction: it was a forceful, watchable movie which sidestepped the usual doppelganger cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of Maori culture, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. Tamahori was an outstanding director – but it was his debut, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his masterpiece.