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In 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest first films of that era, operating at full capacity with the gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class Maori family in Auckland's south: the actor plays the drinking, fighting, bragging dominant benefit recipient Jake, who comes home from pub visits 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 gangland culture and crime, as well as his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a storyteller. One son receives gang tattoos; another is taken to a juvenile reformatory where he is at least educated in the ways of Maori culture – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains self-worth and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is assaulted by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; disaster follows, and Beth forcefully challenges the wretched Jake: “Our people used to be fighters, but unlike you, Jake, they were people with mana, pride; soulful beings …”

Emotional Violence and Confident Direction

Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and delivered powerful blows with the pub scenes, the home scenes and the gang ritual initiation scenes, handling them with assurance and energy. He created a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a distinctly 90s touch of edginess. It was a hit with viewers and reviewers, and – whether positive or negative – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who could see how he could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.

American Films and Diverse Work

Stateside, the director made the noir thriller Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who ignore procedure, and then the David Mamet-scripted adventure drama The Bear with Anthony Hopkins and his co-star as two men who trek through wild terrain after a plane crash. (This film gained cult status when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of filming with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable suspense film, and he earned again directing the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.

Bond Film and Career Shifts

But the high point, or perhaps the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was directing the 007 film Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film derided for having the poorest device in 007 history – a cloaked vehicle. Why would anyone need an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle that makes it difficult to recall its parking spot.

Subsequent Projects and Comeback

After this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. The The Devil’s Double in 2011 starred Dominic Cooper in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and also Uday’s decoy double, used to shield the heir from assassination or kidnapping: this was a punchy, engaging movie which avoided typical doppelganger tropes. And in later years, Tamahori returned to the subject of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with writer his partner. Tamahori was an exceptional director – but it remained his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.