This is a production rife with odd pairings: English actor Daniel Day-Lewis joining up with the Mohawks; James Fenimore Cooper adapted by Michael Mann; disparate composers Trevor Jones and Randy Edelman teaming up. This last pairing seems a suspicious attempt to endow the score of this modern film adaptation of a junior high school literary evergreen with both a golden age of Hollywood dramatic bent (Jones) and a '90s-slick guitar-muzak veneer (Edelman). A strange amalgam that doesn't quite work. --Jerry McCulley | 