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DVD Movie Rating for: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

Rating 4 out of 5 stars

Movie Plot of: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

Set in the starkly beautiful but isolated and lawless wilderness of the American Southwest in 1885. The Missing tells the story of Maggie Gilkeson (Cate Blanchett), and her estranged father Jones (Tommy Lee Jones) and how they are reunited by a terrifying crisis.

Maggie is a hardworking young woman devoted to raising her two young daughters, the teenage Lilly (Evan Rachel Wood) and the younger Dot (Jenna Boyd). To support herself, Maggie works the land and provides services as a healer. One day, Maggie's father, Jones, who abandoned her when she was a child and spent 20 years with the Apache people, returns to reunite with his family but is rebuffed by his daughter. It is only after Lilly is abducted by Pesh-Chidin (Eric Schweig), a psychopathic killer with mystical powers, that Maggie turns to her father for help in getting her daughter back.

The killer and his renegade crew of desperados are terrorizing the desolate territory, kidnapping teenage girls to sell into slavery in Mexico and leaving a trail of death and horror behind them. In a tense race against time, Maggie and Jones struggle to overcome their differences and establish a bond of trust as they try to reach the abductors before they cross the Mexican border and Lilly is lost to them forever.

DVD Production Details of: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Cate Blanchett

Director: Ron Howard

Format: Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby

Aspect Ratio(s): 2.40:1

Audio Encoding: Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Studio: Columbia Tristar Home
DVD Release Date: February 24, 2004
Run Time: 130

DVD Features:
Available subtitles: English, French
Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround)
11 deleted scenes

Three alternate endings

Outtakes

Featurettes: The Last Ride: The Story of The Missing, New Frontiers: Making The Missing, The Modern Western Score, Casting The Missing, Apache Language School

Ron Howard on: Home Movies, John Wayne, Editing, The Filmmaking Process, His Love for Westerns, Conventions of Westerns

Ron Howard's home movies: The Deed of Daring Do, Cards Cads Guns Gore and Death, Old Paint

Photo galleries

Number of discs: 2

The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett Easter Eggs

None

Cast of the movie: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

• Tommy Lee Jones .... Samuel Jones a.k.a Chaa-duu-ba-its-iidan
• Cate Blanchett .... Maggie Gilkeson
• Evan Rachel Wood .... Lily Gilkeson
• Jenna Boyd .... Dot Gilkeson
• Aaron Eckhart .... Brake Baldwin
• Val Kilmer .... Lt. Jim Ducharme
• Sergio Calderón .... Emiliano
• Eric Schweig .... Pesh-Chidin a.k.a. El Brujo
• Steve Reevis .... Two Stone
• Jay Tavare .... Kayitah
• Simon Baker .... Honesco, Kayitah's son
• Ray McKinnon .... Russell J. Wittick
• Max Perlich .... Isaac Edgerly
• Ramon Frank .... Grummond
• Deryle J. Lujan .... Naazhaao/'Hunter'
• Matthew E. Montoya .... Tsi Beoyuao/'Blowing Tree' (as Matthew Montoya)
• Joe Saenz .... Mba'tsu-Naabitin/'Wolf Trail'
• Gandi Shaw .... Izhashe/'Bird'
• Rod Rondeaux .... Hudlao/'The One Who Laughs'
• Juddson Keith Linn .... Chauaiao/'Evening Time' (as Juddson Linn)
• Alvin William 'Dutch' Lunak .... Aii Sionzilo/'Wild Horse' (as Dutch Lunak)
• Elisabeth Moss .... Anne
• Josephine Schwan .... Sally
• Alexandra Elich .... Sally
• Yolanda Nez .... Lii Dahit'een - Dancing Horse
• Heather Gulas .... Captive Girl
• Scarlett McAlister .... Captive Girl
• Aura Jensen-Curtis .... Captive Girl
• Shelby Kocurek .... Captive Girl
• Molly McAlister .... Captive Girl
• Angelina Torres .... Esmerelda Nunez (as Angelina C. Torres)
• Deborah Martinez .... Maria Nunez
• Clint Howard .... Sheriff Purdy
• Rance Howard .... Telegraph Operator
• Arron Shiver .... Rancher
• David Midthunder .... Apache Scout
• Paul Scallan .... Stokley
• Jerry King .... Drunk Soldier
• James Tarwater .... Drunk Soldier (as Jim Tarwater)
• David Garver .... Barker
• Clemente Spottedhorse .... Captured Apache
• Brian Brown .... Mexican Slave Trader
• Toby Holguin .... Mexican Slave Trader
• Eddie J. Fernandez .... Mexican Slave Trader (as Eddie Fernandez)
• Jason Rodriguez .... Mexican Slave Trader
• Ace .... Bird (uncredited)
• Richard Barela .... Townsperson (uncredited)
• Lewis Culbreth .... Townsperson (uncredited)
• Cliff Russell .... Townsperson (uncredited)
• Lourdes Russell .... Townsperson (uncredited)

Photo Gallery of the movie: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

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Reviews of the movie: The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett

This film is entertaining enough, but nothing particularly memorable, emotional or overly original. It's not going to change the landscape of American cinema, but it's an enjoyable ball of yarn that blends gorgeous scenery with a great performance by Cate Blanchett and a story that never bores, but hangs around a little past its bedtime. Two hours and fifteen minutes with only two lead characters and a chase can only truly maintain its momentum if there is more to the story than just the pursuit, and even though this film does have a little bit of humanity beneath its surface, I didn't get pulled into their circumstance enough to consider the lengthy runtime reasonable. That said, I was never truly bored during the film, unlike another recent "epic" movie with a similar runtime (rhymes with SASTER AND VOMMANDER), and appreciated how things were built up nicely early on, and moved at a decent pace once they all hit the road in search of the missing child. That is, until the very end of the film, when things got a little too "Hollywood" for my taste with everyone and their uncle somehow carrying unlimited ammunition around like it was going out of style, and a "heroic" finale feeling a little too unbelievable. One of the things that I liked the most about this movie was its authentic nature, which reminded me of another better Western film from earlier this year, OPEN RANGE, which is why I felt a little more let down by its ending, which felt a little too "by-the-numbers". Then again, this is a Ron Howard picture after all.

And in typical Howard style, the film will likely entertain most everyone with its heart in the right place, a few thrilling moments, a shoot-out scene or two, a voodoo curse or three and a cameo by a bearded Val Kilmer? (seriously, was that him?) Tommy Lee Jones was "okay" and it was especially nice to see him tackling a role that was a change of pace for him. Instead of being a "tracker" in modern day times, he's a "tracker" during the late 1800s here. Way to stretch those acting muscles, TJ! He did have one of the film's funnier lines though, as he's shooting the shit with his Indian friend between battles and asks if he's still banging that "fat girl" up North. Boys will be boys, eh? Blanchett, on the other hand, continues to impress, playing a headstrong woman, who unlike many ladies of her time, wears the pants in her household, chops wood and even kicks a little bum. She's particularly great during the scene in which she confronts Jones' character early on in the film. Wow...that chick is angry! Another required element in a film of this sort is a believable "bad guy" and I'm happy to report that the Orc-like lead Indian baddie here was scary as shit. The man's crater-face alone scared the beejesus out of me. I also liked how the picture spent just enough time with the enemy to establish their point of view as well. Giving the Indians both a "good" and "bad" side also made sense, despite it feeling like it might have been done on account of political and correctness reasons. All that to say that this film didn't exactly remain ingrained in my mind as I walked out the door, onto the streets and straight into the nearest drinking hole, but it was enjoyable enough to sit through, featured yet another solid performance by the always-reliable Blanchett and sure looked mighty pretty. Now back to the point at hand: was that really Val Kilmer?!?

Cate Blanchett plays Maggie, one of those indomitable frontier women who can yank an infected tooth, chop the firewood, handle a pouting teenager, and still find time for a romantic interlude with a handsome cowboy. She is known as a healer, and never turns anyone away, even her estranged father (Tommy Lee Jones in full crag), who deserted her family when she was a child and has been living with the Indians.

She will treat him, but she will not forgive him. But then, when an Indian shaman and his henchmen (some Indian, some white) murder Maggie's lover and kidnap her daughter to sell her into prostitution, Maggie has to ask her father to help her track them so she can bring her daughter home.

In some ways, this is a very traditional set-up, with the quintessential movie plot -- two people who do not get along forced to take a physical and psychological journey together in pursuit of a goal, here in one of the most enduring of movie settings, the old West, 1885 New Mexico. We see the first glimpses of modernity with the appearance of the telegraph, gramophone, and camera, in contrast to the last glimpses of the old, as ancient curses require ancient cures. And the movie reflects its own modernity and underscores its themes of duality, making sure that there are Indians, whites, and Mexicans as both good and bad guys.

Director Ron Howard (A Beautiful Mind, Apollo 13) sustains the bleak and ominous atmosphere with images like a riderless horse returning home, a coyote on the dining room table, rattlesnakes hanging from trees in the midst of a terrible stillness, and with the the pale vistas of the terrain itself, bleached out, craggy, and unyielding.

And the story has some resonance, with themes that circle back. The shaman tells Maggie's father that he has two dogs inside him, a good one and a bad one. Which one will win? He answers, "The one I feed the most." Maggie and her father exchange necklaces -- Indian beads and a silver crucifix -- for protection, and Maggie and her father use the healing methods of their cultures on each other. One parent left a child and another cannot leave a child. Another parent who loses a child cannot continue.

Lilly, the about-to-be-kidnapped daughter, angry because her mother will not let her go to town to see the newfangled invention that records people's voices, says she was born into the wrong family. She is not the only one who thinks that. Maggie is still bitter because her father left. And her father, having lived more with Indians than with white people, is very aware that he is not a part of either. It is an Indian who sent him back to the world he left. He only sought Maggie out because the medicine man said he had to care for his family if he wanted to survive a rattlesnake bite. He knew which "family" that had to be. As Maggie stands near the telegraph while the operater sends the message about Lilly to the cavalry, she sees the girls experimenting with the gramophone that Lilly had asked to see.

This movie has two dogs inside it, a good one and a bad one, and neither one wins. It has strengths, including the willingness to attempt some thematic complexity, reliably solid performances by Blanchett and Jones (with good but brief appearances by Val Kilmer and Aaron Eckhart) and the outstanding Jenna Boyd. But it does not address its themes with enough depth to justify its darkness, and thus does not succeed.

Parents should know that this is an extremely violent movie, with frequent and exceptionally graphic brutal images and many injuries and deaths, including death of a child. A character commits suicide. There are sexual references and non-explicit sexual situations. The plot revolves around a plan to sell the girls into prostitution. Characters drink alcohol and use some strong language.

Families who see this movie should talk about the dualities it emphasizes, including the white/Indian cultures. They should also talk about how the characters determine what their responsibilities are. Could Maggie have left with only two girls? Should the cavalry or the sheriff have abandoned their other duties to find Lilly?