CRUSOE

As the title character, Aidan Quinn is an ambitious slave trader who gambles with the late autumn weather to make one last trip to the west coast of Africa for cheap slaves. Stormy seas wreck his ship on an uninhabited island, though. Quinn's portrayal of a man coming to terms with loneliness and self-sufficiency is fascinating in its detail, but nothing surpasses the irony of Crusoe's ultimate meeting with a native warrior. This intelligent rendition of Defoe's classic, with the camera roving the desert island to marvelous effect, is a powerful but wonderfully understated critique of racism. -London Film Festival.