The Missing (2003)

Cate Blanchett plays Magdalena “Maggie” Gilkeson, a hardened and somewhat bitter frontier woman running a ranch and doing some doctoring on the side as she raises two young daughters.

Her only help: two hired hands, one of whom (Brake Baldwin) would like to marry her.

As for the daughters … the youngest, Dot, relishes the ranch life, but frets for her mom, who is prone to bad dreams and talking in her sleep.

The oldest, Lilly, is just coming of age. She resents life on the Western frontier and dreams of the day she’ll be able to lead a more civilized life.

One day, a white man turned Indian shows up with an ailment. It’s Maggie’s father, who abandoned the family to “turn Indian” years earlier. He’s clearly not welcome. He’s sent on his way.

Then Maggie’s hired hands and daughters head out to brand some cattle. They never return.

Maggie sets out to find them. One of the hired hands is dead, arrows lodged in his back. Brake has been roasted to death. Dot has been hiding, listening to Brake’s screams, glad that they’ve finally stopped.

Lilly is gone, captured by renegades who plan to take her to Mexico and sell her along with their other female captives.

When the law won’t chase the renegades, Maggie has no where to turn but her father, Sam Jones.

It isn’t a welcome alliance in her mind. But it appears to be her only chance to rescue her daughter.

Not that it will be easy. The renegades are led by El Brujo. He’s not only cruel, he’s also a witch doctor with weapons other than a gun or blade.

Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Jones, contemplating a search for his granddaughter in The Missing (2003)

Cate Blanchett as Magdalena Gilkeson finds one daughter, Dot, and realizes the other is missing in The Missing (2003)

Review:

Stellar performances by Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett, a tense plot and more realism than you’ll find in most Westerns certainly put this ahead of most of its 21st century counterparts.

Val Kilmer has a bit role as a cavalry lieutenant who can’t keep his men from looting the home of massacred settlers. Ray McKinnon (the preacher from “Deadwood”) has a bit role as a photographer more interested in saving his own hide than worrying about the plight of the renegade’s captives.

Schweig is suitably nasty in the role of the villain, with a scarred face and photographs of young white women hanging from his vest. But he won’t let his men mate with the captives; they must be delivered unsoiled.

The film’s only downfall, a touch too much other-worldly witch doctoring nonsense. The scene in which El Brujo casts a spell on Maggie from afar simply isn’t necessary.

Evan Rachel Wood as Lilly Gilkeson, a kidnapped girl with escape on her mind in The Missing (2003)

Jenna Boyd as Dot Gilkeson, Magdelena’s youngster daughter in The Missing (2003)

Directed by:
Ron Howard

Cast:
Tommy Lee Jones … Samuel Jones
Cate Blanchett … Magdalena Gilkeson
Evan Rachel Wood … Lilly Gilkeson
Jenna Boyd … Dot Gilkeson
Eric Schweig … El Brujo
Aaron Eckhart … Brake Baldwin
Sergio Calderon … Emiliano
Jay Tavare … Kayitah
Simon Baker … Honesco, Kayitah’s son
Ray McKinnon … Russell J. Wittack
Val Kilmer … Lt. Jim Ducharme

Score: James Horner

Runtime: 137 min.

Eric Schweig as El Brujo, leaders of the band of renegades who capture white women in The Missing (2003)

Jay Tavare as Kayitah, an Indian who joins the search for the female captives in The Missing (2003)

Memorable lines:

Sam Jones, as soldiers loot the cabin of massacred settlers: “I’m going to camp down by the river. If I stay here very long, I might misbehave. And somebody might have to kill me.”

Sam Jones: “I was bitten by a rattlesnake.”
Maggie Gilkeson: “What?”
Jones: “A good shaman gave me two amulets. Told me not to eat rabbit meat for a year, say my prayers every morning, take care of my family and I might get well.”
Maggie: “You’re tellin’ me you came back only because you were following the say-so of some medicine man.”
Jones: “Absolutely. A rattlesnake can make your soul very sick. That’s likely not what you want to hear, but it is the truth.”

El Rujo, showing dirt into Lilly’s mouth after an escape attempt: “This is what the rest of your life will taste like.”

Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Jones, welcoming an old friend to the hunting party in The Missing (2003)

Cate Blanchett as Magdalena Gilkeson, lying in ambush for the renegades in The Missing (2003)

Maggie, as Jones lays an ambush: “Thought we were going to buy her back.”
Jones: “More we kill, easier they’ll be to reason with.”

Magggie, preparing to pull a bullet from Kayitah’s son: “Usually, I don’t operate on Indians.”
Jones: “They have green blood. And there’s a pine cone in their chest instead of a heart.”

Maggie: “That Indian name of yours, what does it mean?”
Jones: “It’s hard to translate.”
Maggie: “Try it.”
Jones: “It means shit for luck.”

Cate Blanchett as Magdelana Gilkeson convincing father Samuel Jones (Tommy Lee Jones) to be her tracker in The Missing (2003)

Aaron Eckhart as Brake Baldwin, Magdalena’s ranchhand and occasional lover in The Missing (2003)

Val Kilmer as Lt. Jim Ducharme, commander of a cavalry patrol in The Missing (2003)

Ray McKinnon as Russell J. Wittack, the photographer who crosses paths with El Brujo’s gang in The Missing (2003)

Cate Blanchett as Magdalena Gilkeson, wary of the Indian joining their party in The Missing (2003)

Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Jones, realizing the Indians have sensed his planned ambush in The Missing (2003)