The Mission – Film Review
by Hugh Maguire

Directors – Amanda McBaine, Jesse Moss
Writers – Amanda McBaine, Jesse Moss
Stars – Pam Arlund, Dan Davis, Levi Davis

As part of the fervour of the late sixteenth-century Catholic Reformation, the ancient Roman basilica of S. Stefano Rotondo (c. 470) was embellished with a series of gruesome frescoes, painted by Niccolò Circignani (c 1517-96) and Antonio Tempesta (1555-1630).  Commissioned by Pope Gregory XIII (1572-85), of calendar fame, they were intended to both inspire and forewarn would-be missionaries (Jesuit missionaries) of the fate that awaited them in foreign climes. Evoking scenes of martyrdom and persecution in Ancient Rome they showed the extent to which believers would go for what they believed in.  The Mission is perhaps, unwittingly, a sobre reflection on what such paintings might actually represent in the real world – especially the real work of the early, and increasingly sceptical, western cultural sphere of the twenty-first century.

For a certain generation, there is only one The Mission – the 1986 vehicle for Robert de Niro, Liam Neeson, Jeremy Irons and BAFTA–winning Ray McAnally.  To astounding cinematography and the sweeping scores of Ennio Morricone – that staple of Lyric FM – the viewer follows a team of Jesuit missionaries in early eighteenth-century South America.  The tragedy that befalls them is down to the perfidy of European power politics, not the failure of their ‘mission’ so to speak.  In this gripping and moving documentary, there is no hint of success, tragedy looms large from the outset.  There are no background power politics – just single-minded obsession.

Much is addressed through a masterful combination of historical footage, evocative animation, extensive social-media records and the insights of friends and associates.  A young Chinese-American caught up in a swirl of evangelical fervour, is convinced that he and he alone can bring the ‘true faith’ to the Sentinelese in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Indian Ocean.  Nourished on teenage fantasies of exploration, the world of Robinson Crusoe (1719), the great American outdoors and a diet of thriller adventure novels, the hapless subject of the film is convinced of his own invincibility.  While his family do not speak to the camera, we have detailed observations of this adoptive father, a practising Christian and a man who has escaped persecution from Mao’s Cultural Revolution.  For all his personal faith he is strongly opposed to his son’s evangelical fervour and the risks that might ensue.

The narrative is straightforward, in its way. We follow the deepening fervour (obsession?) of the hero, the planning and preparation for the impossible, and we are all prepared for the inevitable.  What is remarkable is that we benefit from compellingly edited social-media videos, WhatsApp videos, detailed diaries and the opinions of many classmates and peers.  Revealingly, we see the full force of the crisis of faith that befalls another once devout missionary – who in contrast to the fruitfulness of the Neeson/ Irons fantasy had nothing but fallow reward.  It is a shame that the subject matter might put off a particular audience in Ireland, just by the very nature of its subject.  Ironically, Ireland is a country which still in many quarters of the world is only known of through the activities, for better or worse, of its many missionaries in the past.  There is however a distinction to be made between such orders and the subject of The Mission which is very much, it seems, a one-man band.  There is no organisational safety net, and no restraining hand of a Mother Superior demanding obedience and perhaps common sense.  Objectively the film is certainly disturbing – highlighting how devotion to a cause, any cause, can be so damaging.  It highlights the injuries of Western perceptions of ‘the other’ and how whole cultures have been annihilated throughout contact with us.  National Geographic is to be complemented for its own self-criticism which features large in this work, showing how in the past it contributed to the sense of the exotic and unnamed savage.  It is, of course, taken as a given that the Sentinelese are to be left untouched – that perhaps raises the question of what values we wish to preserve.  Should they be left untouched – that is a debate for another day.