The Missing (2003)

Ron Howard usually plays it both straight and safe, never taking too many risks, never siding too much with abstraction or grey areas, and over the years this has made me somewhat of a non fan. Not a hater, simply seldom blown away or challenged by his work. With The Missing, however, he strayed from the path and brought us a dark, threatening picture of life on the frontier in all its brutal, treacherous glory. With the success of last year's brilliant Bone Tomahawk, I couldn't help but be reminded of this beauty, as there are elements of horror and evil dancing on a thread with origin points in both films. Different altogether, but from the same elemental stew and highly reminiscent of each other. Cate Blanchett is hard bitten single mother Magdalena, trying her best to raise two daughters (Evan Rachel Wood and the excellent Jenna Boyd) with only the help of her sturdy farmhand (Aaron Eckhart). One misty night, someone or something snatches Wood right out of her bed and disappears into the wilderness with her. Magdalena is raw and determined, launching a desperate search across woods and plains to find her kin. Joining her is her half breed injun father Samuel, played by an eerily convincing Tommy Lee Jones. Samuel left her years before and only re-emerges in her life for fear of being punished for forsaking his family in the beyond. Gradually he turns around and a bond is formed through the crisis, an arc which Jones nails like the pro he is. It turns out they are tracking a group of despicable human traffickers who take girls and sell them across the border into sex slavery. They are led by a mysterious witchdoctor (Eric Schweig) whose tactics border on voodoo prowess. It's scary stuff, never outright horror, but sure aims for that with its hazy nocturnal atmosphere in which any denizen of the night could be poised behind the next thicket or cluster of trees, ready to pounce. Blanchett is tough as nails, a terrific female protagonist blessed with a mother's love and a winchester to back it up. Jones is gruff and badass, believable as a native American and treated as a well rounded character seeking redemption in his twilight years. There's also fine work from Steve Reevis, Clint Howard, Elizabeth Moss and a cool cameo from Val Kilmer as a sergeant who helps them out. My favourite Ron Howard film by far. Just a mean, dark genre piece that aims to thrill and chill in equal measures and comes up aces.

This should/could be one of the best wild west movie(if not the best),aside classic westerns.And sad thing is that just couple of simply unnecessary 'events' in the movie ruins that chance. :( .Someone did a mistake of a lifetime,screenwriter or director....or whoever it was, doesn't really matter.I do not have any intention of describing story,and i will definitely read the novel "The Last Ride" written by Thomas Eidson.For two reasons first to make sure i'm not accusing someone wrongly.Second too enjoy if i'm right,and i believe that the novel is just much batter than the movie,as is practically every book turned into movie.

The Missing (2003)A great cast, and great casting, make for the best core of the movie which eventually boils down to a rather well done Western. When you talk about a Western—as in the genre of movies known as Westerns— you probably picture a certain kind of plot, landscape, range of characters, and even morality. How do you make a Western now that avoids the clichés? Well, it's hard. That's one reason they faded away in the 1960s as they became parodies of themselves (not always on purpose) or exercises in excess (sometimes to superb effect, as in "The Wild Bunch" and "The Good, The Bad and the Ugly" genre). Recent Westerns tend to heighten their realism to a level less common earlier, with more brutal violence, more vivid location shooting, and a kind of acting that pulls out all the stops. The recent "True Grit" remake shows how different movies with the same plot can be. And "The Missing" is a very well made contemporary Western that doesn't escape all these pre-qualifications. And that's it's biggest downfall. It does introduce a contemporary idea into late 19th Century society—sex slave trade across the border. I don't know if this was really going on then, but it is meant to be a comment on how it happening now. It makes it really brutal and ugly, of course, and you sympathize fully.But the movie continues some dangerous clichés—the wild Indian, the naive Mexicans, the innocent hard-working pioneer families (wearing crosses), and the loner on his horse who will save the day. The loner is at first unlikely—Tommy Lee Jones—but he's really good. The rest of the cast is fine, sometimes excellent, but trapped (as is Jones) by having to fill stereotypical roles with an added wart or twitch. It's generally watchable, but sadly old hat.There is an aspect here that's truly insulting--at least to the politically correct, or the correct (to avoid that cliché). To repeat the maligning attributes that we have to assume were common but not universal of all these kinds of people is just mean and a little dumb. It makes the movie far less that it could have been.

A well-shot revenge western that has a look of grandeur to it, even if the storyline – a tracker goes after a band of Indians who have kidnapped a relative – is largely familiar. There's something about The Missing that stops it from reaching the same level as films like APPALOOSA or OPEN RANGE, and it may be because of the overly Hollywood stylisation that pops up in places. The film is at its best when it focuses on frontier life and the brutality of the era, but during the flagging mid-section it descends into mumbo-jumbo nonsense with silly nightmare sequences and out-of-place supernatural stuff that date it pretty badly. During these parts I was reminded of an early '90s schlock horror rather than a timeless western.Still, the film does have plenty of reasons to keep you watching. Tommy Lee Jones is an ever-watchable screen presence, although I do feel he was miscast here as the wannabe Indian tracker; something just doesn't sit right with his character and you almost feel like he's playing the same guy out of THE FUGITIVE, just shoehorned into a different era. Cate Blanchett is better, giving her character some warmth and humanity for once, and Evan Rachel Wood does no wrong as the feisty victim. Aaron Eckhart and Val Kilmer are both effective in supporting roles, and the action is decent. Despite Ron Howard's occasional missteps when it comes to the style, his direction is for the most part solid, so the blame would have to be laid on the script which could have done with both some serious tightening to make this a pacier drama and some stronger villains.