Skinwalkers

Starring:Apesanahkwat, Nicholas Bartolo, Adam Beach, James Dalgam, Marla Finn, Saginaw Grant, Michael Greyeyes, Drew Lacafa, Harrison Lowe, Ryan Polequaptewa, Jon Proudstar, Alex Rice, Wes Studi, Sheila Tousey, Misty Upham, Crystal Van Keuren, Gerald Vandever, Noah Watts, Chesley Wilson
Studio: Pbs Home Video
Product Type: DVD

Amazon.com

After the disappointing Dark Wind, executive producer Robert Redford does Tony Hillerman justice with this authentic and ideally cast adaptation of the 1986 bestseller that first paired Lt. Joe Leaphorn (Wes Studi of Dances with Wolves and The Last of the Mohicans) and Officer Jim Chee (Adam Beach of Smoke Signals and Windtalkers) of the Navajo Tribal Police. Leaphorn, a veteran urban cop recently returned to the reservation, is Scully to Chee's Mulder as they investigate a series of murders seemingly committed by a "skinwalker," a shape-shifting evil spirit. Skinwalkers was the first presentation of the venerable PBS Mystery series to be set on United States soil. For Hillerman fans, and those new to his intimately observed world, this is good medicine. --Donald Liebenson

Description

Navajo Tribal Police Officer Jim Chee and Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn investigate murders that lead them into spine-tingling and mystical world of Navajo witchcraft. Three unsolved homicides and an attempt on Chee's life have left the Navajo Tribal Police baffled. Are the murders somehow connected, although they occurred 120 miles apart? Or are they random acts of violence? Chee and Leaphorn's efforts to solve the seemingly unrelated individual crimes leave them with clues that point toward one suspect, in this suspenseful mystery.

Customer Reviews:

Misinformed Writer.......2006-03-05

Hillerman does not know Navajo life and culture, and the plot is totally alein to Navajo people and culture. Those actors and actresses in the movie are not Navajos, do not act or look like Navajos, and the scenecry is not like Navajo land. This is a story about a fictive tribe and culture that exists in the minds of Hillerman and Redford. The Navajo Nation totally rejected this movie when it was shown to them, and that is why it was not filmed in Navajoland and does not use Navajo actors.

Typical Hollywood mangling .......2006-01-31

Typical Hollywood mangling of a great book. Read the book instead. But the book is tougher on the reader than some other Hillerman books.

Skinwalkers.......2005-10-09

Skinwalkers is the first film featuring Native American police officers Lt. Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, who are responsible for officiating crime on a Navajo Reservation.

A Skinwalker is a sorcerer or witch that takes animal form, and commits terrible crimes, including murder. Traditionally, Navajos never say the word Skinwalker, for fear that a Skinwalker will take their life. Skinwalkers practice "bad medicine".

In Skinwalkers, a Native American Medicine Man (Healer) is found dead, his body surrounded by animal-like footprints, and his hand lacerated by a human-bone arrow, a traditional weapon of a Skinwalker.

Chee, struggling between his professionalism and traditional beliefs, feels the killer is a Skinwalker. Leaphorn, a city-reared Native American who's beginning to understand his Native roots, has no doubt the killer is a man who is hunting down Healers.

Together, Leaphorn and Chee seek to protect another Healer from the mysterious killer, and they slowly decrypt Navajo evidence that could lead to a ghostkiller or mankiller.

Skinwalkers weaves together thrilling Navajo folklore and art, mesmerizing copper-hued glowing landscapes, meditative musical lines, and harsh Native American reality - poverty, violence, anger, hurt, and an excruciatingly painful elimination of Native American tradition.

Not Skinwalkers.......2005-08-12

Never have I seen such a good book turned into such a bad movie. Simply put, when compared to the book the movie was horrid. Leaphorn as a bumbling, ignorant around the fort Indian? Chee (Adam Beach was a good choice here) losing control of his emotions and pulling out his service pistol? Save your money on this one.

What were they thinking?.......2005-02-23

I'm not a purist, but I object to this movie. Like other reviewers in this list, I was really appalled by two things:

(1) The assassination of Joe Leaphorn's character. What were they thinking?

(2) The wholesale elimination of the original plot. In this movie the wrong people get murdered by the wrong person for the wrong reasons. In the book the deadly shotgun-toting witch-killer is a deranged young female with a dying baby. You will look for her in vain in the movie. How can an adaptation of a murder mystery casually write the murderer out of the plot?

The book has one of the most righteous endings you'll ever see. The movie? Jeez. Let's all stand in the middle of a stream and shoot at each other!

Is it a good movie? If you never read the book, the movie is OK. If you are looking for "Skinwalkers," it isn't here.

("Coyote Waits," however, was pretty well done. Don't give up the ship.)

Average customer rating:

Skinwalkers
Starring: Jason Behr , Elias Koteas , Rhona Mitra , Kim Coates , and Natassia Malthe
Director: James Isaac
ProductGroup: Theatrical Release
Binding: Theatrical Release

Average customer rating:

Skinwalkers
Starring: Jason Behr , Elias Koteas , Rhona Mitra , Kim Coates , and Natassia Malthe
Director: James Isaac
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Horror | Genres | DVD | Video

( S ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
ASIN: B00005JPDF

DVD:

DVD

DVD

DVD

Burning Down the House

On Approval : DVD

Tierra [1997]

DVD: Kicked in the Head

Love Thy Neighbour