Robinson Crusoe

Defoe is not obvious Bunuel material in the way that Wuthering Heights is but the very tension between director and writer makes it the more interesting film. One scene especially should be viewed by anyone who holds that Bunuel's brilliance lies primarily in his surreal imagery marvelous as this. Crusoe in despair at his his solitude calls out 'The Lord is my shepherd' at the hills. As he he hears only the echo of his his voice even the lush tropical landscape appears to mock him. Once seen and heard(Dan O'Herhiley's voice is wonderful here) the VCR and DVD become redundant. The ending low key and unrhetorical is one of the rare moments of uplift offered by Bunuel. Relish it! Bunuel's adaptation of Defoe is one his rare films,others are 'Cela s'appelle l'aurore','The Young One' and 'Nazarin' in which some sense of optimism in human solidarity moderates the general bleakness of his view of the human condition.