Land of the Blind

Political drama and thriller come together in this début by Robert Edwards, who also wrote the script for Land of the Blind. Ralph Fiennes plays Joe, a prison guard in a high-security jail in a nameless country where a totalitarian regime is at war with a well-organised guerrilla movement. One of the leaders of this movement, the author Thorne, played by Donald Sutherland, is detained in the jail where Joe works. The two men become friends and Thorne tries slowly but surely to win Joe for the terrorist actions his opposition are taking against the sadistic dictator Junior and his First Lady. Joe allows himself to be used by Thorne. Great changes follow, as a result of which the relationship between Joe and Thorne is profoundly changed and the fate of Joe eventually becomes very insecure. Land of the Blind shows how difficult it is to relate loyalty and friendship to political convictions in a virtuoso plot that unmistakably points to gruesome chapters from recent world history, without making direct historical references. (SdH)

• 

•