In the 1890s, after witnessing the massacre at Wounded Knee, cowboy Frank T. Hopkins, Viggo Mortensen, accepted a challenge to race his mustang, Hidalgo, across 4,800 kilometers of North African desert. Hopkins soon finds that the race is a perilous one, - not only is it highly competitive, but there are sand storms, quicksand, booby-traps, bandits and a sneaky Englishwoman, Louise Lombard, who is determined her horse will win. Despite the pressure, Hopkins finds time to get to know the chief Shiekh, Omar Sharif, and his daughter, Zuleikha Robinson.

There really was a Frank T. Hopkins, but I'm not sure how much else of this tall tale is true. The opening scenes are virtually a replay of the beginning of The Last Samurai, with Hopkins taking to drink because he's disgusted by the destruction the white man has brought to the Native Americans (he is half Indian himself). In Arabia he finds he's the underdog, that his horse is a joke because it isn't a thoroughbred like the much-prized Arabian horses he's competing with - but Hopkins won't allow any insults directed at Hidalgo and the audience is left in no doubt that the American will show those sneaky Arabs who's the better horseman and who has the better horse. It's a tremendously patronising film, and a pretty stodgy one, too, despite a few rather contrived action sequences, one of which includes computer generated leopards. Thank goodness for Omar Sharif who brings dignity, and a sly sense of humour, to his otherwise conventionally written role.