Once Were Warriors outgrossed The Piano and Jurassic Park in its country of origin, New Zealand. Fabius Burger spoke to its director and its producer
NEW ZEALAND director Lee Tamahori and producer Robin Scholes are rapid- fire talkers. In South Africa for the Durban Film Festival showing of their first feature movie — the gritty urban drama Once Were Warriors (to be released by Ster Kinekor later in the year) — they have to fit in a lot of interviews in a short time.
It’s a controversial film, about violence and abuse: its central character is Jake, a powerful man who mistreats his wife. “They’re still very much in love,” says Scholes. “The wife faces a difficult choice: leave him after 18 years, or change him. That’s the tension — the audience feels Jake’s so nice, if only he wouldn’t be that way, they’d be such a wonderful family!”
Yes, there were censorship problems. Written by Riwia Brown, the film was based on a novel by Alan Duff, already a controversial figure in New Zealand. Besides, most New Zealand films are subsidised by the government, says Scholes, and “this isn’t the sort of film any state funding agency wants to be associated with”. Criticism from the funders actually helped hone the script, she says. “We’d listen, then sift out what was important and what wasn’t. Our combined strength as director, writer and producer prevented them from interfering in silly ways.”
Their combined strength is formidable: Scholes has the largest prime-time television company in New Zealand, and Tamahori is an acclaimed director of TV commercials.
Together, they wanted to change the industry. Tamahori says New Zealand films were “rural, angst-ridden dramas”. Scholes found them boring — polite stories about “people who come of age in this beautiful, clean, green, wonderful landscape.
“There wasn’t much reality. When we completed Warriors, we thought we wouldn’t get it past the censor, but the censor — a woman — was quite intelligent and saw the violence was anti-violence. She felt that mothers and their children should be able to see the film together and gave it an R13 certificate.”
The film then upset “the politically correct”. Tamahori says: “Warriors is a tough, urban and violent story about a marginal population. But why make your first film some weak, safe piece? Rather go for the high ground, take on the toughest subject in the country.
“We decided this film would be politically very incorrect — not that we went out of our way to do it, but we thought, to hell with it, we’ll make this honest, upfront and raw, and you can take it how you see it. There is a lot of political correctness, coming from too many areas, because we’re multicultured and everyone’s scared of stepping on the other’s toes.”
The film was a major success in New Zealand, outgrossing The Piano and Jurassic Park. Maoris, who seldom go to the cinema, flocked to see it. “If I’d failed,” says Tamahori, “I’d have had to leave the country — I’d have been burned alive.”
Tamahori grew up on American films. “At their best, they can’t be touched. I know you’re supposed to say how wonderful European art films are, and I like all films — Italian, Japanese.” But American action and Sixties movies are the best.
“Okay, it’s very male-oriented, all about rugged individualists, but I’m mad about genres, gangsters, western films, they’re all very compelling. The western is the cleanest, purest form of cinema.”
His love for tough American films shows in Warriors. It’s also behind Tamahori’s next project, a New Zealand road movie — a “hard, dangerous movie” — for the under-25s, about young love on the run. “Youths are being badly treated by the cinema, insulted by this stuff being churned out by an older generation. I grew up on Bonnie and Clyde, Easy Rider and highly rebellious characters, anti-authoritarian outlaws. If you’re not going to rebel by the time you’re 20, when are you going to do it? So I think kids will always react to these dangerous films.”
Then there’s a period piece about the war between the British and the Maoris, a “fantastic story about a Maori chief who invented non-violent protest in a period of enormous violence and turmoil”. So expect more controversy from Tamahori — and a continuation of the renaissance in New Zealand film. Just don’t expect a Beethoven’s 2nd.