Cabeza De Vaca

Being the 500th anniversary of Columbus's "discovery" of the Americas, 1992 saw the release of several historical films related to the conquest of the continent. (1492: THE CONQUEST OF PARADISE and CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS: THE DISCOVERY immediately come to mind.) Made in 1990, Nicolas Echevarria's CABEZA DE VACA stands out for its high production values and its well-drawn revisionist take on the Spanish colonizing enterprise.

The film recounts Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca's eight-year trek across the hitherto unexplored regions of the Gulf of Mexico, one of the most astonishing feats in early American history. Treasurer to the 1528 Florida expedition headed by Panfil...