This film demonstrates its superior quality in every important filmic element: acting, direction, cinematography, dialogue, and plot. The actors are honest and real, and have an excellent grasp on how to deal tastefully with mystery and taboo. The direction is smooth and seamless (check out the scene where the camera pans from the contemporary scene in a Mexican border town to a historical scene invloving Eladio Cruz on the other side of the border). The cinematography is beautiful (I always thought that it was done by Haskell Wexler - the greatest ever - but recently learned that it was Stuart Dryburgh.. Wexler has filmed other Sayles films, including Matewan and Limbo), offering a version of border-country Texas that both illustrates and conflicts with the insiduous, corrupt reality. The dialogue is simple and elusive, and tends to talk "around the point," leaving the true meaning to be dealt with by other cinematic means. The plot is complicated yet not difficult to follow, and reveals information only as it is needed, creating an aura of suspense and mystery not known in the cinematic world since Coppola of the 70's. Like the Godfather films, Lone Star is ultimately a movie about familial relationships.
As far as love stories go, the one included in this film is one of the most painful and beautiful I have ever seen.This movie is flawless.
"Lone Star" is terrific as both a mystery and as a snapshot of small town America, Texas-Mexican border style. However, it is something else going on here. As Sam moves between the Hispanic, White, and Black communities in Rio County, we see how members of each group feel that their ethic group is different and separate from the others. However, in the end, the movie shows us how we are all pretty much the same and the degree that our lives are intertwined. (Look for a scene in an African-American bar where a record is playing on a jukebox. Later, virtually the same record, this time sung in Spanish, is played on the jukebox in a Mexican restaurant.) At the end of the film there is a final surprise that pretty much left me stunned while driving home the point of just how closely related to each other we all are.
