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An excerpt from this feature film

The credits from this film.

The trailer for this feature film.

The making of Once Were Warriors. Behind the scenes footage.

An interview with Mamaengaroa Kerr-Bell - behind the scenes of Once Were Warriors.

An excerpt from this feature film

The credits from this film.

The trailer for this feature film.

The making of Once Were Warriors. Behind the scenes footage.

An interview with Mamaengaroa Kerr-Bell - behind the scenes of Once Were Warriors.

Once Were Warriors

Film (Trailer, Excerpts, and Extras) – 1994

RP16

Restricted

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You’re not gonna hurt my babies anymore.
– Beth Heke (Rena Owen)

Cook the man some f***ing eggs.
– Jake Heke (Temuera Morrison), to Beth (Rena Owens)

It's jolting and electric, charged with the immediacy of its characters' anger and hurt. Morrison and Owen turn in stunning performances.
– American critic Stephen Farber, in Movieline

Once Were Warriors had a huge impact in the tattoo world. There's not one tattoo that we drew on I felt pen in that movie that I haven't seen done for real since, because whether you like it or not, you are putting images in front of a lot of people.
– Tattoo designer Inia Taylor, in the press kit for Warriors sequel What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?

...I found this master Māori musician: Hirini Melbourne. And he played all these...he brought them all in, all these Māori instruments. I'd never heard of any of them. They were about 30 of them, spread on this big rug . .. like the bullroarer ... which we used a lot in Once Were Warriors. It worked great."
– Composer Murray Grindlay

The film is a social tragedy, observed in love and pain. It's also a study of class animosities within a race ... by the end, Once Were Warriors has left an ache in your heart, a hole in your gut.
– Critic Richard Corliss in Time Magazine, 6 March 1995