Director Costa-Gavras is well known for a filmography that trades in overt political themes, and his English-language debut, 1982’s superb Missing, is no different.
The film unfolds in an unspecified South American country but is adapted, by Costa-Gavras and Donald Stewart, from a book by Thomas Hauser that dramatizes the controversial disappearance of American filmmaker and journalist Charles Horman during the 1973 coup in Chile. Once Charles (John Shea), a thorn in the side of his host country’s military ruling elite ever since his arrival, disappears, his wife Beth (Sissy Spacek) and father Ed (Jack Lemmon) wade into a bureaucratic morass to try to find out what happened to their loved one.
Bold and gutsy, Missing is a political tract that doesn’t pull punches about unsavory American complicity. But it also works just fine as a family drama (“I just want my boy back,” pleads Lemmon’s character at one point). The acting is fantastic (Spacek and Lemmon have an edgy chemistry, highlighting their different tacks of preferred action), but Missing is also a film of small, telling details — whether it’s of a Marlboro man billboard looming in the background as a reminder of American influence, or the lack of a handshake for Beth when first visiting the ambassador’s office. Vangelis’ score, a thin string of dread that occasionally builds to a delicate aria, abets the proceedings wonderfully.
Criterion’s wonderful new release of Missing comes spread out over two discs, in a sturdy plastic case that features a two-spindle snap-in tray on the inner righthand side of the case, leaving room on the lefthand side for a nice color booklet that features an interview with Costa-Gavras, an open letter from Horman family friend Terry Simon, the official U.S. State Department response to Missing, and a new essay by film critic Michael Wood. The restored, high-definition video transfer, overseen by Costa-Gavras, is presented in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio, in monaural English and Spanish, with optional English subtitles.
The film itself, along with its theatrical trailer, reside on one disc, while a second disc of supplements is anchored by new video interviews with Costa-Gavras; the real-life Joyce Harmon, mother to Charles; producers Edward Lewis, Sean Daniel and Mildred Lewis; and Hauser, the author of the film’s aforementioned source material. There are also video interviews from the 1982 Cannes Film Festival with Costa-Gavras, Lemmon and the parents of Horman, plus highlights from a 2002 Charles Horman Truth Project event honoring Missing, with Spacek and a variety of other actors in attendance. Rounding things out is a video interview with Peter Kornbluh, author of The Pinochet File, examining declassified documents concerning the coup in Chile and the case of Charles Horman. To purchase the Criterion DVD via Half, click here; to purchase via Amazon, click here. B+ (Movie) A- (Disc)