The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada is a politically charged re-telling of the American myth of the Western.  Through the use of film, director and star Tommy Lee Jones, and screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga comment upon social aspects of American culture, while using catharsis as a means to mediate across ideological and cultural borders, and to do justice for the victim of a discriminatory crime and its cover-up.  The U.S and Mexican borders appear as both a character and a metaphor in the film.  Lee and Arriga de-construct the frontier myth by means of casting a dark eye on social, racial and sexual scripts and schemas.  Elements of earlier films that have attempted to do so, such as Pekinpah’s Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia are evident as their narrative journey unfolds.

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