Owing to the presence of Daniel Day Lewis – the man so deeply into the craft of acting he does all the extreme tricks to assure the integrity of his character (staying in character throughout the shoot, etc) – and Michael Mann behind the megaphone, I expected much more from this film and was disappointed that it turned out to be little more than a period potboiler.

It's more interesting from a historical angle as you learn about the Native American tribes who aligned themselves with the British and French armies doing battle for the colonies. Day Lewis is Hawkeye, a white man bought up by the Mohican tribe who fights alongside the British and rescues the daughters of a local officer from a bloodthirsty attack from another tribe.

As he falls predictably in love with the beautiful, headstrong and soft-spoken elder sister (Stowe), the menacing leader of the tribe who attacked is gunning for them all out of vengeance for the loss of his family in the war, tracking them relentlessly through the forests. There were a few turns in the story I couldn't understand and the whole thing seemed melodramatic rather than just dramatic.