In the Valley of Elah (2007) on Netflix
R20072h 4mCrimeDramaHistoryMysteryThriller
Mike Deerfield, a soldier just back from Iraq, goes missing from his base in New Mexico. His father Hank, a retired military police sergeant, drives out to look for him.
- Netflix3.6/5
- IMDb7.1/1077,807 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes73%
Trailer
Plot summary
Hank Deerfield drives a gravel truck in Monroe, Tennessee, where he lives with his wife Joan, and he once served as a military police sergeant. Word comes that his son Mike, a soldier newly returned from Iraq, has vanished from his base in New Mexico. Hank heads to Fort Rudd, meets the men in Mike's squad, and quietly slips his son's cell phone out of his belongings. Detective Emily Sanders cannot assist him at first. Then Mike's body is found, and the base claims jurisdiction, pointing to a pipe under his mattress and drug arrests on post. Sanders, dismissed by her male colleagues, pushes the local sheriff to keep the case, and Hank talks her into taking him to the scene.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about In the Valley of Elah (2007)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Writer-director Paul Haggis wrote the part of Hank Deerfield for Clint Eastwood and approached him first, but Eastwood turned it down because he was already involved with other projects.
- The story, with names and places changed, is based on the 2003 murder of Iraq War veteran Richard T. Davis; Davis's father Lanny, a former military police officer, carried out his own investigation, just as the character played by Tommy Lee Jones does.
