The Missing
Review by Cathy Edsey Collins for Reel Movie Critic
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Cast
Cate Blanchett	Maggie Gilkeson
Tommy Lee Jones	Samuel Jones
Evan Rachel Wood	Lily
Jenna Boyd	Dot
Directed by Ron Howard. A western drama. Rated R for violence. Imagine Entertainment. Running time: 130 minutes.

"The Missing," unrelentingly tense and almost excessive in its violence, is perhaps director Ron Howard's least touchy-feely movie to date. A tad too long at 130 minutes, this unique western is a riveting drama that is compelling and unnerving, a squirm-in-your-seat suspensor.

At its center is another "I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar" performance by the prolific Cate Blanchett-an actress who has cornered the Meryl Streep, strong woman roles of late in "Veronica Guerin," "Charlotte Gray" and even the "Lord of the Rings" series. In "The Missing," Blanchett portrays Maggie Gilkeson, a proudly independent single mother of two girls, cohabiting with lover Brake Baldwin (Aaron Eckhart) on her New Mexico ranch in 1885. Like "The River Wild" and "Panic Room," which demonstrated the force of maternal love, "The Missing" has Blanchett's Maggie doing her best John Wayne to protect her daughter.

When her estranged ailing father Samuel Jones (Tommy Lee Jones) returns to find peace after a thirty-year absence, Maggie fiercely denies him entry into her life, blaming him for the deaths of her brother and mother. This family drama takes an unexpected turn, however, when Brake is brutally murdered by Indians and her teenage daughter Lily is kidnapped. Without the support of local law enforcement, Maggie is forced to ally with her father-who has spent these years as an Indian himself-and track down Lily before she is sold across the border in the Mexican slave trade.

Central to this band of Apache and white desperadoes is its ringleader Chidin (Eric Schwieg), a grotesquely disfigured Indian witch, with a penchant for wearing photographs of his victims. His mottled complexion and jagged teeth make him one of the scariest looking villains in any western and certainly rewrite our embattled cinematic image of the Native American.

Based on Thomas Eidson's novel "The Last Ride," the strength of this cinematic rendition lies in the performances of Blanchett and Jones, each infusing something special into characters that could easily fall into stereotypes. Blanchett's nuanced take on a woman toughing it out in the wilderness and trying to teach her daughters independence is remarkable, her stoicism evident in every detail, including her rough, reddened hands.

There is little relief, however, in "The Missing" from the constant flight, the ever-present danger, the cruel violence. A few conversations between daughter and father¾attempts to patch their relationship with understanding-occur between rounds of fire and surveillance, but these are brief moments of quiet introspection. A handful of lame jabs at humor by Jones' character (the mock of a fat Zuni girl, a Butch Cassidy moment on a cliff) are inappropriate in this film of loss and ultimate redemption.