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90 out of 101 people found the following review useful: surprising hero, substantial villain, 9 March 2004 Author: kevincisneros2003 from vega, new mexico
This movie is about New Mexico, not Arizona, and therefore deals with some elements of Southwestern frontier life that either are left out of most "Westerns" or are portrayed in a completely different way.The first element is "mixed blood" persons. Although it is never clear whether Tommie Lee Jones' character is a white man living as an Apache, or is a "mixed blood," of bi-racial parents, who tries to live as both white and Apache, it doesn't matter. What matters about is that we see that only the bad people, of both races, resent him. The good people of each race -- eventually -- accept him for who he is.The second element is the general representation of English settlers. Whenever an English person is shown in a Western movie it is either as a silly dude or an arrogant gunslinger. But most English were, like Mr. John Tunstall the rancher, from Canada, and were accustomed to the roughness of frontier life. So, here, Cate Blanchett first appears on-screen in an outhouse holding a wad of catalog paper.The third element is the matter of social hypocrisy. Oscar Wilde (who once visited the American West) said, "Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue." Thus, Cate Blanchett insists her occasional bed-mate never sleep with her when visitors are present on the homestead. Rather, he should keep up appearances, and sleep in his usual bed, in the bunk house. In other frontier movies unmarried cohabitation is either flaunted or causes great anxiety and guilt for the participants. But here, the characters of Cate Blanchett and Aaron Eckhart realistically consider their behavior to be decent and civilized.The fourth difference has to do with the U.S. Army of the day (the 1880s). Val Kilmer is perfect as a well-intentioned officer who is unable or unwillling to take charge of them. To him, the mission must be defined by headquarters, not by the obvious facts. Thus stripped of initiative, he becomes more of a hindrance to peace in New Mexico Territory than a help. Some viewers may find themselves wishing, "At least he could be evil!" but it is not to be. Kilmer's character embodies that great grayness of real life that Western movies try to clarify as black and white.Five: Sexual slavery. Yup, folks, girls are being kidnapped and sold into slavery elsewhere, for sexual purposes. This was not unusual in New Mexico. This movie makes it horribly clear that for sexual purposes a stupid girl is as good as a smart one, an ugly one as good as a pretty one, an unpleasant one as good as a pleasant one. Nope, these girls are kidnapped for only one quality, which as girls they all have equally.The sixth element which distinguishes this from other Westerns is the relationship of death and heroism. The heroism here is not the usual kind in Westerns because it requires the hero to die. Otherwise, even if he was successful in his mission, he would've been simply more powerful than the villain, or luckier, and neither of those are moral qualities. The only other stories where this is typical behavior is in Nordic stories -- the only Viking heroes are dead, and they are heroes because they willingly died in order to achieve their goals. The Norse heaven, Valhalla, is filled with men who died trying.The last difference is the substance of the villain. The bad guy here is a "brujo," an Apache witch-man. But he is not the usual "renegade medicine man" or fiercely-proud-but-understandably-misguided warrior. Nope, he captains supernatural forces that most viewers normally associate with wolfmen, vampires and so on. He really is evil, and his skills are greater than Cate Blanchett's (she's a Christian healer). He is brilliantly portrayed by Eric Schweig, whom most viewers probably have seen only as the young Mohican in 1992's "The Last of the Mohicans." Schweig is one of those actors who are usually assigned Indian roles because of their faces -- and probably become dispirited after a few years, when they realize that no one can or will write a role for them that is anything more than the usual. There are only a handful of actors, of any race, who could've done justice to this this "brujo" role. Schweig is so good here that the movie would've been a "tour de force" for him had not Tommie Lee Jones' dramatic experience stood in his way. In real life, Schweig is a mixed-blood Canadian, and a maker of excellent masks. No one will ever let him play Hamlet, because of his race, but maybe now screenwriters will see that serious roles can actually be written for actors such as he.In short, if you know New Mexico you'll deeply appreciate this movie, and tip your hat to director Ron Howard if you ever see him.
48 out of 57 people found the following review useful: Spectacular Low Paced Western, 15 December 2004 Author: Claudio Carvalho from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
In Nineteenth Century New Mexico, Maggie Gilkeson (Cate Blanchett) is a lonely rancher and healer, living alone with her two daughters, the teenager Lily Gilkeson (Evan Rachel Wood) and the ten years old girl Dot Gilkeson (Jenna Boyd), and her assistant and lover Brake Baldwin (Aaron Eckhart) and the employee Emiliano (Sergio Calderón). When her absent father Samuel Jones (Tommy Lee Jones), of whom Maggie feels grief for leaving her when she was a child, visits the Gilkeson's family, Lily is kidnapped with other local women by a group of rebel apaches to be sold as slave in Mexico. The Indians, leaded by "el brujo" (the witch) Pesh-Chidin (Eric Schweig), kill Brake and Emiliano, and Maggie, having no other person to support her beyond the young Dot in the search for Lily, asks her father to track the captives. The weird trio follows the kidnappers, being the beginning of a spectacular low paced story. "The Missing" is a magnificent contemporary western, having a great plot with drama, mysticism, action and thriller. The characters are slowly developed in a very consistent way, and have outstanding performances of Cate Blanchett (as usual), Tommy Lee Jones and the starlet Jenna Boyd. The locations are stunning, and the soundtrack is very powerful. My vote is nine.Title (Brazil): "Desaparecidas" ("Missing")
34 out of 42 people found the following review useful: very good, suspenseful film, 10 March 2004 Author: darryn bates from Australia
Very reminiscent of 'The Searchers', probably the best of the John Wayne-John Ford teamups, 'Missing' plays better as a thriller set in the West, than as a 'mystical Western' (which is what I think it was really going for). Predictably excellent performances from Cate Blanchett, Tommy Lee Jones, and a fantastic performance from Eric Schweig as the Apache witch doctor. I was surprised to discover the film was mostly dumped on by critics in the US, and bombed there. It's had a much better response here, as I think it should have. Look out also for Evan Rachel Wood, so good in 'Thirteen', as the older of Blanchett's two daughters. This ranks as Ron Howard's best.
42 out of 60 people found the following review useful: Yes, there was something MISSING, 9 March 2004 Author: unbend_5440 from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
Ron Howard did not intend to make a straight up Western movie. That's the first problem here. Howard didn't want The Missing to be identified with a specific genre. This is part Western, part period drama, part mystical thriller, part action movie. Using several genres to make this unique could have worked, if Howard had combined them all in one. But the problem is that he seemed to keep changing his mind every 25 minutes of screentime. At first it's a period drama about a family, then it's a western, then it's an action movie, then it's a mystical thriller. There was no consistency with what the story was supposed to be. To add to this, The Missing was too long. I have no problem with long movies. I don't mind movies that are 3:30 hours long, if every scene feels like it belongs and is relevant. But here, there are several scenes that could have been cut. And going back to my complaint about there not being a specific genre, I think it could have worked if it was only a period drama/action/western. But when it got into the mystical Indian witchcraft, I checked out. We had more than an hour and a half building this up as a legitimate and realistic dramatic film taking place in the western time period, and all of a sudden, it's a fantasy movie. If it had been about mystical Indian witchcraft from the start, those scenes would not have been out of place. But to spring it on the audience the way it was done, it was totally out of place.I feel a little weird making my complaints about The Missing, because I actually did enjoy watching it, for the most part. I thought it built an interesting story and I was satisfied with how it concluded. Tommy Lee Jones is at his best since Rules Of Engagement. Cate Blanchett was without a doubt at her best since Elizabeth. And the dialogue is fantastic, as is the Cinematography. James Horner surprise me with his score. It was different from what I'm used to him doing. I loved the story and thought it was entertaining to watch. So why doesn't The Missing work as well as it could have? Simply because Ron Howard had a very ambitious idea about how to make a Western movie different and unique, but didn't spend quite enough time developing it. If Howard had taken an extra 6 months of pre-production, I'm convinced this could have been the brilliant movie that Howard probably had a vision for.
21 out of 22 people found the following review useful: Bleak, chilling suspense on the frontier., 25 November 2003 Author: modern_maiden
The premise of this film that the main character (played by Cate Blanchett) is a rancher and doctor living in the wilds of New Mexico. Her daughter is kidnapped by a group of outlaws led by a psychopathic witch doctor. At the same time, her estanged father (played by Tommy Lee Jones) enters her life, and she is faced with her deep hatred of him, weighed against her need for his help. The rest of the story I won't give away.I've read whisperings of Oscar nominations, which may be a fair statement, but although these rumors have been directed towards Blanchett, I would say that Jones had the stronger performance. Blanchett was excellent as well though, depicting a hard-laboring no-nonsense rancher perfectly, not trying to inject any glamour into her role whatsoever, as might have been the case if certain other big name actresses had played the role. I am forever amazed by Blanchett's versatility! The girls playing the daughters were excellenttoo, specially the youngest one, who had a number of intense emotional scenes.I liked the bleak feeling presented in the film...the raw climate, the hopelessness combined with determination that the characters portrayed. The heroic rescue attempts were not without their screw-ups, making the story much more realistic than a typical Western shoot-em-up hero movie.I also enjoyed the element of mysticism, which was pulled off without being too corny. The main villain in this film was quite possibly the creepiest, ugliest villain to grace the screen in years! Yet somehow it wasn't too trite either.My personal beef with most Hollywood epics is that friggin' annoying sweeping soundtrack music, which practically spells out to you how you are supposed to feel, replacing the emotion that should have been created by the acting and directing. Thankfully, the soundtrack didn't overwhem this film. Just some well placed ambient music which supplemented the scenes nicely.Definitely one of the better films I've seen lately. I rate it 8/10.
24 out of 32 people found the following review useful: A slice of TRUE western history, finally brought to life..., 7 January 2006 Author: Missileman1 from United States
As a 'local' – Arizona – long-time US southwestern resident and historian, I have to bite my lip occasionally at many of the ridiculous reviews for this excellent Ron Howard film.It's so easy to spot the ignorant…For all their emotion about this film, most reviewers' clichés, inaccurate statements, mistaken references, mis-understood, mis-referenced or mis-opted views of 'Western movies' (let alone, southwestern history, and general mis-direction of history en toto), grossly reveal the puerile, Hollywood brain-damage…Pity … they could have learned a lot if they only KNEW. Not only is Ron Howard's effort well-directed, it's very historically accurate. Point-in-fact: his acting crew, notably Tommy Lee Jones, had to learn whole sentences/paragraphs in the Apache-ne-Athe(p/b)ascan derivative language (as well as their meanings), in not just short, 'indian' phrases as in most 'Western-style' films, but to those which accurately depict the spoken word of the time. None less than Elbys Huger, Berle Kanseah and Scott Rushforth did Howard employ as linguist-teachers for the actors for accuracy (please, do your research). In addition, western settlers at that time on the southern borders of New Mexico and Arizona were vilely subjected to early forms of terrorism in the southwest – including what you see on-screen. Those bands of Mescalero/Chiricahua natives were normally (though not totally) averse to kidnapping young, white females of European descent for slave-trading from western settlers (as well, married adult females). However, and in particular addition, rituals of northern-Sonoran Indians – Yaqui (there were other tribes) – vastly apart from Cochise's band of Chiricahua Apaches, were especially ruthless against 'whites', employing those very diatribes Eric Schwieg (aka, 'el brujo', 'Pesh Chidin') perpetrated against western immigrants. And, BTW, Schwieg was absolutely SUPERIOR in the role – the man surely deserved not only credibility, but Oscar consideration – he is that good; if you knew only a sliver of southwestern history, you'd know his portrayal is not only authentic, but well-portrayed (eastern-USers, Canadians, take note – you've no conscience of southwestern US history unless you've studied/lived it – mark my word, Pilgrim).Re/ The Entertainment value: - TLJones: always a distinct pleasure, thank you Thomas – extraordinarily well-done, and one of your very best efforts – applauses; how-went the linguistics for the film? - Ms. Cate Blanchett: as well, extraordinary effort; you are, still, a gem-in-the making, and exceptionally well-suited for the part – truly, WELL DONE …you exemplified the character. Where did you learn about the southwest of the US??) - Jay Tavare: your portrayal of 'Kayitah' was exemplary and believable. Nice going! You have more Hollywood parts in your future – stay with it. - Steve Reevis: "Two Stone" – you should have been cast earlier in larger roles. Enjoyed you in 'Last of the Dogmen' - Even, Jenna: stay with it - in a few years you may think about changing your mind – maybe even now; you both have the energy – how badly do you want it??9.5/10 -- believe it; or buy a history book and educate yourself about the REAL southwestern US
26 out of 37 people found the following review useful: One of the best westerns i've ever seen., 13 July 2004 Author: Ben_Cheshire from Oz
Cate Blanchett has been surviving just fine on her own, but when some indians kill her boyfriend and kidnap her eldest daughter (she has one other, who's quite good), she is forced to ask her strange and estranged father (Tommy Lee Jones) for help.Ron Howard finally made that western he's been dreaming of since he was a kiddie putting together home movies of men on horses riding into town (which you can find on The Missing DVD) - and i hope it surpasses his wildest dreams. Its widescreen wild-west vistas make this one of the most beautiful films to come out of Hollywood in years. Cinematography is superb, to say the least.And its suspense is perfect. I wasn't bored one minute - it is regulated by violent outbursts from the indians at unexpected intervals. As soon as we're about to wonder why we were so scared of the indians, we are reassured why.Virtually constant camera movement and hand-held work take us into the world of The Missing, and make it really come alive. Ron Howard really knows what he's doing.10/10. A beautiful, suspenseful, outstanding film.Parent's Warning: its quite violent. Many graphic deaths, many more where the violence is strongly suggested. Make sure your audience is over, say, 16.
20 out of 26 people found the following review useful: An absolute, hands-down, modern classic, 23 February 2004 Author: Louis Brough from stoke on trent, England
Set in the year of 1885 Maggie Gilkeson (Cate Blanchett) is a doctor who along with her two daughters, Lilly and Dot and friend Brake Baldwin, happily live on a ranch in New Mexico. Until, one day a ghost from Maggie's past appears who, turns out to be her estranged father, Samuel Jones (Tommy Lee Jones). But Maggie does not wish to see her father after a troubled childhood so she sends him on his way and hopes to get on with her life without him. However, when her eldest daughter Lilly (Evan Rachel Wood) is kidnapped by a rebel group of ex-soldiers led by a witch doctor, Maggie has no choice but to ask her father to help track down the kidnappers and find her daughter.Full of continuous epic action 'The Missing' is a film that does not show many faults and has everything you want to see in a first rate film, from tension to suspense with loads of great drama, tremendous acting and even witchcraft.Director Ron Howard does it yet again, creating a superb film which I think he can easily put into his best of list. The only real bad thing about this film is that it goes on a bit too long (which in all fairness couldn't really be helped) but despite that, it grips you and holds on tight both unpredictable and unforgettable with great performances from Tommy Lee Jones, who never ceases to amaze, Cate Blanchett who is as good as ever, Evan Rachel Wood Gives another super performance and I was particularly impressed with young Jenna Boyd.* * * * * (5 stars)
10 out of 10 people found the following review useful: A Tight, Suspenseful Western, 2 April 2004 Author: John Harvey (jharvey@johndharvey.com) from Providence, RI
"The Missing", starring Cate Blanchett and Tommy Lee Jones, is one of those movies that will come and go without getting noticed by audiences let alone any of the award programs. That's a shame because it's a tightly plotted film with interesting, sympathetic characters in a Western setting, but minus most of the tired Western genre devices.In "The Missing", Cate Blanchett plays Maggie Gilkeson, a tough, frontier doctor / rancher with two young daughters (played by Evan Rachel Wood and Jenna Boyd), and a farmhand / love interest (Aaron Eckhart) named Brake, who also acts as her family's dedicated protector.Unexpectedly, her father (Tommy Lee Jones) comes back into her life after abandoning his family years before to live with the Indians. His attempts to make amends for his past mistakes are rebuffed until rogue Indians attack Gilkeson's family and kidnap one of her daughters. Reluctantly, she asks her father to use his hunting & tracking skills to follow the Indians and recover her daughter.The story in "The Missing" works along two tracks. While following and clashing with the rogue Indians provides ample suspense, action, and peril, the emotional drama between Gilkeson and her father keeps the movie interesting, dynamic, and makes us care about these peoples. For a Western, the film lacks all of the cardboard cutout characters. There are no gunslingers (in the tradition of Clint Eastwood's spaghetti Westerns) in "The Missing". The characters are flawed and emotionally vulnerable in their own believable, endearing way.As a film, "The Missing" also provides a rare, balanced view of Native Americans during the mid 19th century. They are portrayed as neither doe-eyed victims (as in "Dances With Wolves"), nor are they mindless savages (as in almost any John Wayne Western). I will note that Chidin (Eric Schweig), the primary "bad guy" Indian, seems to go a little over the top at times, but this is forgivable given the film's many other strengths.Suffice it to say that all of the acting is solid. We probably won't see any 'best actor' or 'best actress' nominations, but you never do with Westerns. Blanchett continues to expand her repertoire ranging from eccentric British Queen ("Elizabeth") to destructive bar trash ("Shipping News") with this role. Meanwhile, Tommy Lee Jones continues to be typecast as "the guy who hunts people" which started years ago with "The Fugitive" and hasn't varied much since.In the end, one of the things I liked best about "The Missing" is the genuine danger for all of the major characters. The film establishes early on that bad things can and will happen to the characters we like the most. As a result, it's impossible to guess who will make it to the end of the story and that means you have real suspense (an increasingly rare occurrence in suspense films).So, go see "The Missing" while everyone else is piling into the better-marketed blockbusters. You know you'll get both a good seat and a good movie without a lot of fuss.
10 out of 10 people found the following review useful: I liked this A LOT., 29 February 2004 Author: Deirdre from Bonnie Scotland.
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
I don't understand why so many people seem to dislike this film. It has an awful lot going for it, a superb cast, gripping story line , much accuracy, excellent direction and cinematography,superb scenery, not to mention the darker side of Native American beliefs. *****POSSIBLE SPOILER.... Tommy Lee Jones was superb as Cate Blanchets estranged father, and the fact that it was hinted that Lilli, the 'missing' daughter was concieved in less than ideal circumstances was, I think pivotal to the animosity Blanchets character felt toward her father, the fact that he was not there to protect her when she needed him. The fact that Jones was not expecting to be forgiven, but had in fact turned up when he did as the result of being bitten by a rattlesnake and as part of his 'cure', suggested by a medicine man, was that he should not eat rabbit for a year and go look after his family, shows that he had turned up for purely selfish reasons, much the same motivation as to why he left in the first place. **********The complex and compelling characters are acted superbly by a first class cast, without exception, and the deep and more sinister back ground of the brujo man gives this an element not often seen in a film of this genre. I love Westerns, though this film is much more, it is a superb study of human interaction, in a difficult and brutal era in the history of the American people. Ron Howard is to be congratulated for giving the depth to these characters that so many classic westerns dont.
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