The Mission

Set in eighteenth-century South America, The Mission follows Father Gabriel, a Jesuit who travels into the jungle to establish a mission among the Guaraní people. Rodrigo Mendoza, a mercenary and slave trader, arrives at the mission seeking redemption after killing his brother in a duel. He converts and becomes a priest, and the two men work together to build a community. Their efforts are threatened when the colonial powers of Spain and Portugal transfer control of the territory, forcing the missionaries to decide how to protect the Guaraní from enslavement.

Roland Joffé directed the film, his second feature after The Killing Fields, from a screenplay by Robert Bolt. Robert De Niro plays Mendoza and Jeremy Irons plays Father Gabriel, with Ray McAnally, Aidan Quinn, Liam Neeson and Cherie Lunghi among the credited cast and crew of 30 and 113 respectively. The film was a co-production involving Argentina, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Colombia, Paraguay, the United States and France, and was made on a budget of 25 million dollars. It earned about 17 million dollars worldwide, less than its cost.

Audience reception has been steady over time: on IMDb it holds 7.4 out of 10 from around 71,000 votes, and on TMDB it also holds 7.4 out of 10 from roughly 1,600 votes. A critics' rating of 6.3 out of 10 from 30 reviews places it below those audience scores.