The Count of Monte Cristo Review
by Mark R. Leeper (markrleeper AT yahoo DOT com)January 29th, 2002
THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO
(a film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Alexander Dumas's classic story of revenge and the power of money comes to the screen again in a sumptuous adaptation. Edmond Dantes, by a trick of fate, goes from having his life unjustly ruined and being a helpless
prisoner to being one of the richest and most powerful men in the world. The new version takes liberties with the story but uses them wisely to add excitement. Rating: 7 (0 to 10), +2 (-4 to +4) Warning: there are spoilers, particularly for people who do not know the famous story.
My copy of THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO by Alexander Dumas, pere, is over 1200 pages long. By page 220 Edmond Dantes has already been in and out of prison and is a rich man. That part of the story is really little more than a prologue in the novel as Dumas wrote it, though in the new film version it is about half the film. That is the part the fans of the story know well and it is really the origin of the character, so in a film version that is the part of the story people are going to want accurate to the original. For example, in a movie of Batman it is the origin and the cast of the character that people know and has captured their imaginations, not the story that follows. The comparison to Batman is not a light one since essentially THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO is a superhero story of its day. We start with some poor nebbish who has been supremely misused by some very nasty people and the world in general. Suddenly he is given the power to crush the evil- doers and he takes on an alter-ego identity to do it in secret. Edmond Dantes's special power is financial power. There is more than a little of THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO in Batman or Spiderman. Like Batman, the Count even has a loyal sidekick, a reformed smuggler named Jacopo.
The classic story by Alexander Dumas (or whomever, but I won't get into that) is of the young sailor Edmond Dantes (played in this go-round by James Caviezel), who just was promoted to ship's captain in 1815 and is ready to be married. But before he can be married, he is betrayed and framed for treason by three different men, each for a different reason. His cruel and mind-numbing punishment is to be imprisoned at the Chateau d'If. After sixteen years of barbarity and stone, he escapes having learned the location of a fabulous legendary treasure, more money than an army could spend. He now has the power to avenge the injustice done him.
The first half of Jay Wolpert's screenplay for this new version tracks the plot of the early parts of the novel reasonably well, though several changes have been made to inject more fighting and action, and in general to make the story more cinematic. Fernand Mondego (Guy Pierce) in this version is a shipmate of Dantes. Dantes actually meets Bonaparte which he never did in the novel. Accused of treason, he temporarily escapes on the way to prison and gets into a sword fight with Mondego. The warden at the Chateau d'If prison (Michael Wincott) is a sadist who whips the prisoners annually. These are all revisions. In prison Dantes learns to read and write and then to get a full education. It seems most unlikely that a man who could not keep a ship's log could be made a captain. Exciting as his prison escape is in the novel, it is goosed up to much more of a hair-breadth escape in the film. These may all be considered acceptable liberties taken with the story to make it better cinema. Certainly this film is more faithful to the spirit of the original story than was director Kevin Reynolds's earlier film ROBIN HOOD, PRINCE OF THIEVES.
James Caviezel would be fine as the title character. (I admit I was expecting it to be Guy Pierce when I saw the opening credits.) His only problem is a distinctive profile that would have given his secret away. Luis Guzman is a good enough actor, but somehow he does not seem to fit Napoleonic times. Richard Harris as the old Abbe Faria adds a touch of splendor, even if his cell is greatly overdone (not unlike the bat cave in THE MARK OF ZORRO).
This new production looks handsome with the rocky coast of Ireland and occasionally Malta standing in for France and the Mediterranean settings of the story. The score, by Ed Shearmur, while not up to the classic score that would have accompanied this sort of film in the 1940s, is sufficient to spice the action scenes with their athletics and swordplay. Those action scenes are delightfully consistent with Newtonian physics with nary a hint of the hidden wires or digital enhancement that have become common recently. There is just of whiff of anachronism in the martial arts. Irritatingly, the climactic sword fight seems to be shot at twelve frames per second and then slowed back to normal speed. This is a style that I first noted in GLADIATOR and which seems only to detract and distract.
THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO is not a perfect swashbuckler, by any means, but as one that uses plot and drama rather than wirework or CGI is a sign that adventure films may be going back in the right direction. I rate it a 7 on the 0 to 10 scale and a +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
[email protected] Copyright 2002 Mark R. Leeper
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