La Mancha

Alonzo Quixada, a middle-aged Spaniard, is so enthralled by knights' tales of gallantry, chivalry and adventure in the days of yore, that he renounces his old identity to become Don Quixote De La Mancha. Dressed in ancient rusty armor and mounted on a broken down horse, he appoints Sancho Panza, a neighboring peasant, to be his squire and believes a washerwoman to be the Lady Dulcinea, his muse.

Jailed during the Spanish Inquisition for offending the church, author Miguel de Cervantes (O'Toole) is forced to act out one of his manuscripts for the entertainment of fellow inmates. Cervantes delivers a rapturous performance as the legendary Don Quixote, the chivalrous knight whose choice to see life as it should be, not as it is, takes him into battles with an imaginary foe and into romance with the beautiful Dulcinea (Loren).