The Mission
The Mission
PG | 29 September 1986 (USA)
The Mission Trailers

When a Spanish Jesuit goes into the South American wilderness to build a mission in the hope of converting the Indians of the region, a slave hunter is converted and joins his mission. When Spain sells the colony to Portugal, they are forced to defend all they have built against the Portuguese aggressors.

Reviews
Boobirt Stylish but barely mediocre overall
Limerculer A waste of 90 minutes of my life
Helloturia I have absolutely never seen anything like this movie before. You have to see this movie.
Cassandra Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.
oscar-35 *Spoiler/plot- The Mission, 1986. A man of the sword and a man of the cloth unite to shield a South American tribe from brutal colonial subjugation by 18th century forces.*Special Stars- Robert De Niro, Jeremy Irons, Liam Neison, Fernando Ghia.*Theme- Truth must be acted upon.*Trivia/location/goofs- 1986 Cannes Film Festival winner. Best Cinematography Oscar. Filmed in South America with real jungle primitive tribes that were employed and film monies paid into a set-up trust fund for the benefit of the indigenous tribal peoples.*Emotion- An epic film that always rates very high with audiences, film schools, and film critics. Outstanding film music and color photography with delicious film production attributes served up to the film viewers.*Based On- 18th century era history and colonial lore.
mark.waltz This is the story of atonement, the story of forgiveness, and the story of how new faith takes more drastic steps than the old faith. While it is difficult to believe Robert De Niro as a Spanish warrior, it comes to be easy as his transformation occurs. In the opening scene, he's catching natives of South America and turning them into slaves. He comes upon the Jesuit mission run by Jeremy Irons and makes it clear that he sees these natives as animals meant to serve the "civilized" European than be taught about Christianity. A sudden turn of events involving younger brother Aidan Quinn and his lover, Cheri Lunghi, turns De Niro into a shell of himself, and thanks to the head of the Jesuit ministry, he ends up right back where he started, in the South American jungles, aiding Irons in creating the mission. But his old cohorts become his enemies, determined to destroy the mission and make more profits with new slaves.While Irons' missionary is a peaceful man, more prepared to die than fight, conflict soon erupts between the methods of the two men now on the same side. A young Liam Neeson plays another one of the missionaries, finding that he has a combination of both men's beliefs, and in the end, they fight two wars with their enemies: the spiritual war of God where death brings honor, and the violent war of man, where the point becomes to fight regardless of the outcome and to exhaust the enemy in a world that they aren't completely prepared for. Of course, there's gorgeous jungle photography where in the opening, the natives actually send a missionary to his death, floating over a huge waterfall on a cross. It's with the power of peace through a pure soul and simple musical cords that Irons managed to get through, and that musical theme is one that will sing in your heart long after the film is over.While some of the casting made me cringe, particularly of a few of the enemies, I found that De Niro and irons really became their characters. De Niro's breakdown after a climb up a huge mountain range is extremely emotional, and as he is forgiven by the natives who obviously recognize him (but were lucky enough to escape), more emotions take over. The children, especially, are enchanting, and you'll not soon forget the one with the infectious laugh. The children become just as heroic as the adults, and if you are like me, you'll jeer at the fat obnoxious slave trader who refers to a singing native child as a trained monkey. When he keeps refusing to allow the missionaries to speak by his constant braying of "Your eminence!", I wanted to stand up in the middle of the movie theater and demand that he shut up. This is a film that will make you look at the evils of racism and slavery, and condemn the perpetrators to hell, unlike Irons, who obviously had the ability to forgive even under the most vile of circumstances.
Uriah43 "Rodrigo Mendoza" (Robert De Niro) is a slave trader in South America who kills his own brother in a fit of jealous rage. Although he is not convicted by any court he still regrets his action and because of that he shuts himself out of society in a nearby church. Eventually, he decides to seek forgiveness by doing an extremely difficult penance. When that is finally accomplished he becomes a Jesuit monk working at a newly built mission far inside the jungle helping the same tribe he had tried to enslave. Unfortunately, time doesn't stop and all too soon other slave traders appear with the main goal of tearing down all of the missions in the area thereby ending any refuge for the unfortunate Indian tribesmen. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie I will just say this was a slow but powerful film which manages to capture the beautiful scenery of South America along with the power and greed prevalent during this particular time in history. It also won several awards including the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival along with being nominated for "Best Picture" at the Academy Awards. Again, while it's rather slow at times, it's still something worth viewing for those who might be interested in this type of film.
paul2001sw-1 Roland Joffe's stately film, 'The Mission', tells the story of indigenous Americans first embraced, then abandoned, by a Catholic Church more interested in power than in good. But the film has failings: there are multiple lead protagonists (including Robert de Nero whose role seems inadequate for his star billing), denying us a consistent perspective; the pace is slow; and the battle scenes at the end more confused than dramatic. I also found Enrico Morricone's story invasive and partly unnecessary. In addition, the plot can be summarised as bad stuff expected, bad stuff happens: it's a story extraordinarily devoid of twists. The scope is broad, but for such a simple tragedy, a smaller movie might have serviced better.