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Wonderful Movie

Fresh and Exciting

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

What can I say? I watch this movie every time it comes on TV and have been since 1983. It tugs at your heart strings and the ending will leave you sobbing like a baby out of joy. Kate Nelligan turns in an excellent performance as the distraught mother and Judd Hirsch is just as good as an overworked cop who can't resist trying to help. Stockard Channing is very convincing as the best friend who is frustrated by mom's refusal to believe her child will never be seen again. This movie stands the test of time and I will continue to watch it whenever it plays on TV. HBO has been running it quite frequently lately and the ending alone makes it work rewatching. Highly recommended!!

What kind of MORON lets their kid (let alone a 6 year old kid!!) walk anywhere alone?? Really?? You don't live in some "safe" country town, you live in new york city, ffs! I don't care if the kid wants to feel like an adult, you walk with him! I had a hard time getting all broken up about this one. I see all kinds of people saying have a box of Kleenex, etc... I'll agree that some of the acting is worthwhile, but a tear jerker? Not so much. And I'm not trying to be heartless when I say this, but everyone knows after 48 hours the cops stop looking for a live person and start searching for a corpse. I know the parent(s) aren't going to admit it to themselves, but the people around them should at least start looking at them with that knowing, sad look. It would be more realistic.

It's surprising that so few films have been made about what surely has to be the most excruciating experience that any human being can go through: the disappearance of one's child. The only two movies that I have seen on this subject are the TV-movie Adam, which is excellent and unbearably painful, and this film, which is also excellent but… well, the ending does seem to be a copout. I suppose there are actually crazy old people who abduct kids to have them as sort of house slaves – at least I'll assume that's so for this movie's sake. But I think the film does a disservice to the unfortunate thousands of parents who don't ever see their kids again. Some parents eventually find out the tragic fate of their children who had died under torture by deviants of the lowest order, and some parents just never find out anything. There are those who say that the latter (not ever knowing) is worse. The fact is, this film is so powerfully acted - particularly by Kate Nelligan – that we feel every depth of her despair, and we find it almost as unbearable as she does. Had the film had an ambiguous ending with her just never knowing what had happened to her son, it would have been an extremely unpleasant experience, but it would have been better to allow the audience to experience something more honest and realistic. It would actually be more healing for them. People need to share that sort experience with others, not just go home with a satisfied smile saying, "ahh, at least I can sleep tonight – all is well". I want to know and feel what the mothers of disappeared children really go through. At least the film does give most of its length to that experience, so I'm grateful at for that. I also like the fact that the mother-son relationship is honestly portrayed, instead of it being the kind of 'perfect child' and 'perfect mother' characterizations that movies such as this usually try to shove down our throats. Overall, this is a superbly acted, gut-wrenching, and suspenseful, intelligent drama that does deserve at least a fair amount of respect for the honest emotions it displays. I just wish it had the courage to be the catharsis that our society needs to get through the real traumas in our lives that don't have happy endings.

Somehow you could tell this was NOT a True Story.It was more like a Hollwood movie of the 40s than anything resembling real life. The only time a missing kid appears like that is if he got lost or something. We had the usual cliches: the psychic who "saw" whatever it is they see and the helpful policeman. To say nothing of the rather stupid scene where a known paedophile,who just happenned to have a pair of the kids blood spattered underpants in his pocket.Even more unreal was the mother talking to him in his cell awaiting arraignment and somehow believing he knew nothing . And did I miss something but apparantly he was known to her once having domne some work in her house. This is when it got beyond being even silly.His reason for the blood spattered underpants was because he'd cut himself shaving and he'd nicked them from her house...I think. And herein lies a question: if this guy WAS guilty and the police roughed him up to get a quick conviction then it would have been a miscarriage of justice thing there. Now THAT'S real life Nothing about testing the blood but maybe they did and it was the same type as his. I would say this movie was rubbish.Stockard Channing was better in Grease