Main Cast: Fabrizio Bentivoglio, David Ngoombujarra, John Moore, Rebecca Frith, David Franklin
Release Year: 1999
Country: DE/AU
Run Time: 91 minutes
Plot
Recalling Peter Weir's Last Wave (1997), Manuela Alberti directs this thriller about Monsignor Tommaso (Fabrizio Bentivoglio), who dreams that an Australian aborigine is trying to tell him something. When he learns that his daughter is missing and that the part of the country in which she lives is terrorized by a serial killer, Tommaso hops on the first plane. He soon encounters Willie (David Ngoombujarra), the aborigine of his dreams. The duo search the outback looking for the missing girl before running into city-born aborigine cop Sutherland (John Moore). ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Cast
Fabrizio Bentivoglio - Monsignor Tommaso
David Ngoombujarra - Willie
John Moore - Detective Sutherland
Rebecca Frith - Susan
David Franklin - Father O'Brien
Fiorenzo Fiorentini - Cardinal Valetti; Elise McCredie - Leditschke; Duane Moore - Corinthian; Martin Vaughan - Father John; Peter Docker - Local Cop
Credit
Allison Pye - Art Director, Alison Barrett - Casting, Dina Mann - Casting, Kerri Mazzocco - Costume Designer, Monica Pearce - First Assistant Director, Manuela Alberti - Director, Ken Sallows - Editor, Sandra Schulberg - Executive Producer, Hans Huttman - Executive Producer, Rudolf Wiesmeier - Executive Producer, Yvonne Collins - Line Producer, Bruce Smeaton - Composer (Music Score), Christopher Kennedy - Production Designer, Geoffrey Hall - Cinematographer, Lynda House - Producer, Jim Stark - Producer, Lloyd Carrick - Sound/Sound Designer, Manuela Alberti - Screenwriter
Set in the late 19th-century New Mexico, Samuel Jones (Jones) reappears hoping to reconcile with his adult daughter Maggie Gilkeson (Blanchett). She is unable to forgive him for abandoning the family and leaving her mother to a hard life and early death. This situation changes when an Apache medicine man (Eric Schweig) and a dozen of his followers who have left the reservation pass through the area, ritualistically killing settlers and taking their daughters to be sold into prostitution south of the American border. Among those captured is the elder daughter of the family, Lily.
The U.S. Cavalry refuses to help retrieve the captive women as its resources are tied up conducting forced relocation of captive Native Americans. This leaves Maggie, her father, and the younger daughter alone in tracking the attackers. The group meets up with Kayitah, a Chiricahua, and an old friend of Jones, who also happens to be tracking the attackers with his son Honesco, because among the captives is a young Chiricahua woman who is engaged to Honesco. After the two agree to join the group, and Maggie treats Honesco's injuries, Kayitah informs Maggie that Jones had been a member of their Chiricahua band where he gained the name Chaa-duu-ba-its-iidan (translates as “shit for luck”) during his wanderings.
It is finally with the combined efforts of the two families that they are able to free the women at the cost of Kayitah's life and immediately flee to the mountains with the kidnappers behind them. Knowing they have no other choice but to stand their ground, the group fights off the remaining kidnappers and during the battle, Jones fights El Brujo, the one responsible for kidnapping his granddaughter, Lily. When Brujo attempts to kill Maggie, Jones sacrifices his life to save his daughter as both he and Brujo fall to their deaths. Maggie realizes her father's love for her and finally forgives him at his death.
