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During 1994, this director Lee Tamahori delivered one of the biggest debuts of that era, firing on all six cylinders with his gut-wrenching socially conscious melodrama Once Were Warriors. The Mekes represent a blue-collar Maori household in South Auckland: Temuera Morrison plays the drinking, fighting, boasting dominant benefit recipient Jake, who returns from pub visits with his weak followers to terrorise and assault his wife Beth, portrayed by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the fate of his older boys who have fallen into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his sensitive daughter the girl, who has talent as a writer. A son gets gang tattoos; another is taken to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the ways of indigenous heritage – the haka and the traditional weapon – and gains dignity and pride. Meanwhile at the disordered home, the daughter is raped by a repulsive acquaintance “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and the mother passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our people once were warriors, but in contrast to you, Jake, they were people with mana, dignity; people with spirit …”

Emotional Violence and Skilled Filmmaking

Tamahori unleashed with all this intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with the pub scenes, the home scenes and gang initiation rituals, handling them with assurance and energy. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt picture with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It was a hit with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in Hollywood who recognized how he could bring that dynamism and flair to commercial projects.

Hollywood Career and Varied Projects

Stateside, the director directed the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about aggressive police officers who ignore procedure, and then a script by Mamet survival thriller The Bear with the actor and his co-star as characters who trek through the wilderness after their plane crashes. (This film gained cult status when its producer Art Linson wrote humorously about the chaotic circumstances of shooting with a trained bear in his witty Hollywood book What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a decent suspense film, and he earned again filming the sequel in the XXX series XXX State of the Union.

Bond Film and Career Shifts

Yet the peak, or perhaps the nadir, of his American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film mocked for having the worst gadget in the series – the invisible car. Why would anyone need an invisible car, audiences wondered? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to recall where you parked it.

Subsequent Projects and Return

Following this, the director found some more interesting form. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in dual parts of the dictator's hideous son Uday and also Uday’s decoy double, employed to protect the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a punchy, engaging movie which sidestepped typical doppelganger tropes. In subsequent times, he returned to the theme of Maori culture, making The Convert in 2023, collaborating with Australian critic-turned-screenwriter Shane Danielsen. He proved to be an outstanding filmmaker – but it remained his first film, the heartfelt Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.