Q:Build a movie plot around this: Who had luck finding the woman Melquiades claimed to be his wife? Perkins
A:
South of Texas, in the desert. A jeep driven by one man wearing army clothes stops on the road. The man and his buddy see coyotes in the distance eating something behind some rocks. The buddy shoots the coyote, and they both go to see what's happening.THE FIRST BURIAL OF MELQUIADES ESTRADAPeter "Pete" Perkins (Tommy Lee Jones) goes to a south Texas hospital to find out what the forensics say about that death of his friend Melquiades Estrada (Julio Cesar Cedillo), a Mexican cowboy hired by Perkins as his aid at the ranch where he is a foreman. Pete throws up because the corpse of Melquiades is badly decomposed from having been buried in a shallow grave. Police officers are busy running after immigrants and flirting with their girlfriends, and thus take no interest in this obvious murder case.A border patrolman, Mike Norton (Barry Pepper), promises his wife Lou Ann Norton (January Jones) a nice little house after moving to their Texas border town, Van Horn. Later he becomes very violent with one of the Mexican immigrants. She (Vanessa Bauche) was trying to run away during a crossing, but she stays back to defend her husband. Mike hits the lady with excessive brutality.Pete talks to another of the patrolmen. He's come back to the location of the murder and found .223 bullet casings in the area. However, captain Frank Belmont (Dwight Yoakam) doesn't want to worry about that; he is more concerned about getting a quiet breakfast from diner waitress Rachel (Melissa Leo), a married lady with whom he is having an affair.Violent Mike is told off by his boss, Captain Gomez (Mel Rodriguez), because there may be problems arising from his vile treatment of prisoners. When Mike goes home, his wife Lou Ann is more interested in her diet - although she is pin thin - and watching a soap opera than talking to him or even having sex with him, something which she allows him to do (for the few seconds he lasts) while she is watching TV. No passion there. When he finishes, Lou Ann is still looking at Mary (Jourdan Henderson) and...