E X T E N S I O N ROBINSON CRUSOE AT THE CINEMA Robinson Crusoe was a very popular story in its time throughout colonialist1 Europe. People liked the message of the book: where the white man goes, he is able to dominate wild nature and wild people and he becomes rich and the master of everything. Crusoe represents the middle-class man of success, talent and luck. He has the spirit of a modern businessman. He looks like a benevolent master to Friday, but his behaviour2 is the behaviour of a slaver3. In the first four months after its publication, Defoe s novel had four editions and by the end of the nineteenth century it was published in over 700 editions, translations and imitations. There was also an opera by Jacques Offenbach. The story of Robinson Crusoe has also become very popular through many television and film versions. In 1925 there was the silent film Little Robinson Crusoe with Jackie Coogan as Crusoe. In the black and white version of 1932, which was filmed in Tahiti, the actor and producer Douglas Fairbanks Senior was Mr Robinson Crusoe. In this film a rich yachtsman4 bets5 with some friends that he can live on a desert island for a year. In 1952 Luis Bu uel directed The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. The Irish actor Dan O Herlihy plays the part of Crusoe. He suffers from terrible solitude and has hallucinations6. He starts to feel better when he meets Friday (Jaime Fern ndez). Through Friday, Crusoe understands that good cannot exist without evil7. We find a completely different setting8 in the 1965 version Robinson Crusoe on Mars in which Crusoe is an astronaut who is on a hostile planet. 1. colonialist: when a country rules/ governs another. 2. behaviour: the way you do things. 3. slaver: a person who sells slaves. 4. yachtsman: someone who has or sails a yacht (a type of boat). 5. bets: risks an amount of money on what will happen. 6. hallucinations: frightening visions. 7. evil: the wicked and bad things. 8. setting: place and time. 69