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During 1994, the film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, firing on all six cylinders with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar indigenous family in South Auckland: the actor plays the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his pathetic sycophant mates to terrorise and assault his wife Beth, played by Rena Owen, and their five children. He shows no concern to the future of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his gentle daughter Grace, who has talent as a storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; the other is sent to a youth detention where he is at least tutored in the ways of indigenous heritage – the war dance and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”

Raw Emotion and Confident Direction

Tamahori let rip with all this emotional violence, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and energy. He crafted a gutsy, sincere film with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and critics, and – whether positive or negative – deeply impressed studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how Tamahori could apply this energy and flair to mainstream genre material.

American Films and Diverse Work

In America, the director directed the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who care nothing for protocol, and then a script by Mamet adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin as two men who journey through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This moderate movie gained cult status when its producer he wrote amusingly 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 filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.

Bond Film and Career Shifts

But the high point, or maybe the low point, of his Hollywood career was taking on the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; this was the installment mocked for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point such a car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to remember where you parked it.

Subsequent Projects and Comeback

After this, Tamahori discovered renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of Saddam Hussein’s hideous son 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 typical doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an exceptional filmmaker – but it remained his debut, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.