The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada

[SlitheryDee]

I just watched this movie and it left me with quite a few questions. I'm definitely going to pick up the book after this.

Why does Melquiades' (presumed) wife deny knowing who he was? One thought that occurred to me was that she remarried while he was still alive and that would invalidate her current marriage, but what's up with the scene in the mexican convenience store where the two (hot) girls get all giggly as though there's something funny about Melquiades' wife living in town. Why is there no explanation for the picture??

What's up with Jimenez being a pile of rubble when Pete get to it? According to the flashbacks Melquiades was living there ~5 years ago with his (presumed) wife and children. Now it's abandoned? Was that even Jimenez? The Border patrol guy (can't remember his name) seem to be merely humoring pete when he looked at the picture and said "Yeah, This is it".

Most of all the point of this movie seemed to be about the strong bond across racial barriers between Pete and Melquiades, but there was more to it than that. Or was there? Is my political correctness getting in way of my understanding of a much deeper moral? Or is this movie ultimately just a collection of strange and vulgar scenes?

 

[Brutuskend]

I don't really know the answers to your question.

I just assumed he was delusional. But I don't know.

 

[SlitheryDee]

Originally posted by: Brutuskend
I don't really know the answers to your question.

I just assumed he was delusional. But I don't know.

Well Pete might have been a bit...er...strange, but the movie doesn't present itself as being told from Pete's perspective. All the stuff in the movie supposedly actually happened to him, instead of occurring in his mind. Technically his mental state doesn't figure into my questions, it's the explanations for the actions of the people he encountered that elude me.

 

[SlitheryDee]

Oh and where was the SECOND BURIAL? I must have missed it because it seemed to me that the movie jumped directly from the first burial to the third. Does this second burial occur in a less "literal" fashion than the other two? Maybe it was the burial of his past life?

Maybe I think too much about movies with relatively simple plotlines?

 

[SlitheryDee]

One more bump and I'll let it drop...

 

[Brutuskend]

First burial was in the desert after he was shot, second was in the grave yard, third was down in Mexico.

And I meant Melquiades Estrada was delusional.