The Mission is a 1986 British drama film about the experiences of a Jesuit missionary in 18th century South America. The film was written by Robert Bolt and directed by Roland Joffé. The screenplay is based on the 1942 play "Das Heilige Experiment" (The Strong Are Lonely) by Austrian playwright Fritz Hochwälder. The movie stars Robert De Niro, Jeremy Irons, Ray McAnally, Aidan Quinn, Cherie Lunghi and Liam Neeson. It won the Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Cinematography. In April 2007, it was elected number one on the Church Times's Top 50 Religious Films list. The music, scored by Italian composer Ennio Morricone, was listed at number 23 on the AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores.

The film is set in the 1750s and involves Spanish Jesuit priest Father Gabriel (Jeremy Irons) who enters the South American jungle to build a mission and convert a Guaraní community to Christianity. The Guaraní community above the perilous Iguazu Falls has tied a priest to a cross and sent him down the falls to his death. Father Gabriel travels to the falls and plays his oboe. The Guaraní warriors, captivated by the music, allow him to live.

The Mission may refer to:

Roland Joffé (born 17 November 1945) is an English-French film director who is known for his Oscar nominated movies, The Killing Fields and The Mission. He began his career in television. His early television credits included episodes of Coronation Street and an adaptation of The Stars Look Down for Granada. He gained a reputation for hard-hitting political stories with the series Bill Brand and factual dramas for Play for Today.

Joffé was educated at two independent schools: the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle in London, and Carmel College in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, which was Europe's only Jewish boarding school, until it closed in 1997. He completed his formal education at the University of Manchester.

In the early 1970s, Joffé had attended Workers' Revolutionary Party meetings, but he never became a party member, and by 1977 he had long severed his association with it: "I was very interested in politics at that time. But I was interested in what all the political parties were doing, not just the WRP, and I was never actively involved."

Ennio Morricone, Grand Officer OMRI, Italian pronunciation: [ˈɛnnjo morriˈkoːne], (born November 10, 1928) is an Italian composer and conductor, who has written music for more than 500 motion pictures and television series, in a career lasting over 50 years. His scores have been included in over 20 award-winning films as well as several symphonic and choral pieces. Morricone is most famous for his work in the Spaghetti Westerns directed by his friend Sergio Leone, including A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965), The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966), and Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) but his career includes a wide range of composition genres making him one of the film world's most versatile artists. He is considered as one of the most influential film music composers of the 20th century.

Born in Rome, Italy, Morricone took up the trumpet as a child and attended the National Academy of Santa Cecilia to take lessons on the instrument at the age of nine. He formally entered a conservatory at the age of 12, enrolling in a four-year harmony programme. He received his trumpet diploma in 1946 and started working professionally, composing the music to "Il Mattino" ("The Morning"). Morricone soon gained popularity by writing his first background music for radio dramas and quickly moved into film.