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In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching socially conscious drama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes are a working-class Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor is the drinking, brawling, boasting dominant benefit recipient the father, who comes home from drinking in the pub with his weak followers to terrorise and assault his wife Beth, played by the actress, and their five children. He is entirely indifferent to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gang life and illegal activities, as well as his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. One son receives tattoos; the other is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least tutored in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns self-worth and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but unlike you, they, they were people with mana, pride; people with spirit …”

Raw Emotion and Skilled Filmmaking

Tamahori let rip with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with confidence and energy. He created a bold, sincere film with a very 90s streak of brash and trash. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced industry executives in the film industry who recognized how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and flair to mainstream genre material.

Hollywood Career and Varied Projects

Stateside, the director made 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 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 droll tinseltown memoir 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.

007 Movie and Career Shifts

But the high point, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s Hollywood career was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with the star; it was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – a cloaked vehicle. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.

Subsequent Projects and Return

After this, the director discovered some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also Uday’s decoy double, used to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: it was a punchy, watchable film which sidestepped typical double cliches. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the theme of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer Shane Danielsen. Tamahori was an outstanding filmmaker – but it was his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.