Man Of La Mancha

Though "Man of La Mancha" enjoyed 2,329 Broadway performances, bringing it to the screen proved expensive, as United Artists squandered $12 million in the belief that the leads needn't sing effectively to make the movie a hit--a silly notion since the music is everything in this historical opus. Thrown into a 17th-century dungeon for offending the Spanish Inquisition, Miguel de Cervantes (Peter O'Toole) busies himself writing the outlandish, delightful tale of errant knight Don Quixote (enacted by O'Toole), who tilts at windmills, followed by his servant, Sancho Panza (James Coco). Aldonza (Sophia Loren), a sluttish serving wench, becomes the virginal Dulcinea, the...