Les disparues

God, how this film touched me. I saw something in Ms. Blanchett that I have never seen before; she actually became the character from the book and I was moved. After seeing the movie I tracked the book down ( it was difficult believe it or not ) and finished it in six hours. I am wondering why the screen writers changed the final scenes. Don't get me wrong, Ron Howard makes good to great movies ( this is a solid film from the historical point of view as well ) but I am left with more questions for him than I feel I will ever get answers.

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 excellent

too, 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.

I'm typically not a fan of Westerns - being female may have something to do with it. But I liked this one. It has a good story, along with superb character development that causes you to care what's going on in the film.

The most stand out aspect for me was the villain played by Eric Schweig. He totally creeped me out. I looked up his IMDb photos and he looks nothing like he did in the film - so the makeup department had a lot to do with making his face as ugly as they did. It really adds to the evil nature of this man.

Jones is quite convincing as a white man wanting to be Indian. His face looks so aged and weathered - you believe he has lived out in the harsh western wilderness all his life. I'm a big fan of his and could watch him do his thing all day.

The director and writers did a good job of creating tension and suspense in the film. There are numerous fight and chase scenes that had me on the edge of my seat. There is quite a bit of explicit violence so this isn't one for young kids to watch.

I think the movie weaves a good tale of hardship, tragedy, failings, forgiveness and redemption. The title, I think, refers to not only her daughter that is missing - I think it refers to several themes missing in the life of Cate Blanchett's character. First, there is the missing dad that abandoned her. There's the missing trust of men in general since she apparently was the victim of rape - and that subsequently resulted in the birth of her daughter. There are also the fathers of her daughter's who are no where to be seen - so that her daughters are having to grow up without a dad as well. No husband either (just a live-in boyfriend). She is totally alone and has to fend for herself and her girls. Blanchett does a great job of bringing the steeliness of her character to life.

Without giving away what happens, I found the ending very touching.

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.

The picture deals with a family formed by the mother (Cate Blanchett) , two daughters and her lover (Aaron Eckart ). The grandfather (Tommy Lee Jones) appears after long time . Then , the oldest daughter (Evan Rachel Wood) is kidnapped by the Chiricaghua Apaches and they set out in looking her for . They will have to confront a lot of dangers and they will track down a group of Indians commanded by a villain and ominous sorcerer . The confrontation will be terrible .

In the film there are shootouts , noisy action , wonderful landscapes , fights and a little bit of violence . In the support cast of the film appears various actors who usually play Indians roles , such as Eric Schweig and Steve Reevis , because being native origin , and both of them along with Tommy Lee Jones learned some words of the Chiricaghua language . Eric Schweig along with Wes Studi , Graham Greene , Tantoo Cardinal , Michael Spears , Rodney A Grant and Floyd Westerman , among others , appear in almost all movies with Indians , starting with : ¨Dancing with wolves¨ and continuing with ¨The last Mohican¨ . And a brief role for Val Kilmer, who previously worked together director Ron Howard in Willow , as Kilmer lives on a nearby New Mexico ranch, agreed to producers a secondary cameo in this film . The motion picture didn't obtain success and was a real flop at box office , in spite of the extraordinary sets (New Mexico) , enjoyable cinematography and atmospheric musical score by the great James Horner. The flick will appeal to Indians western fans