🔗 Share this article The Director's Debut Once Were Warriors Revealed a Director of Guts and Flair During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, operating at full capacity with his heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class indigenous household in Auckland's south: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who returns from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and abuse Beth, his spouse, portrayed by Rena Owen, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his older boys who have drifted into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a storyteller. One son gets tattoos; the other is sent to a juvenile reformatory 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 self-respect. But back at the disordered home, the daughter is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Uncle Bully”; disaster follows, and the mother forcefully challenges the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …” Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and energy. He created a bold, heartfelt film with a distinctly 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material. Hollywood Career and Diverse Work In America, the director 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 wild terrain after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote amusingly about the turbulent production of filming 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 second in the XXX series XXX State of the Union. 007 Movie and Professional Changes Yet the peak, or maybe the low point, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was directing the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall where you parked it. Later Work and Comeback After this, the director found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son the character and as well as Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the heir from assassination or kidnapping: it was a forceful, engaging film which sidestepped the usual double tropes. And in later years, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, making 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.