...everything a good, old-fashioned adventure story should be: daring, flamboyant, exciting, heroic, and supremely romantic.
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Alexandre Dumas the elder could well be called the father of the modern potboiler, so it's no wonder there are so many rousing film versions of his adventure stories. Think of "The Three Musketeers," "The Man in the Iron Mask," "The Corsican Brothers," and at least a half a dozen previous film renditions of "The Count of Monte Cristo." And being the throwback to earlier times that I am, I'm a sucker for all of these swashbuckling tales. This newest, 2002 account of "The Count of Monte Cristo" is maybe the best of them all, a stirring adaptation of Dumas's novel, despite certain obvious changes, and the movie inspired me as much as the book inspired Mark Twain's young Tom Sawyer well over a century ago. "The Count of Monte Cristo" may not make for great art, but it does make for great escapism and always has. This latest movie edition does the Count and his escapades justice.
Costume dramas in general and period action melodramas in particular have been increasingly declining in favor with the viewing public. But there was a time when actors could make whole careers out of such things, silent screen stars like Doug Fairbanks and Rudolph Valentino and their later counterparts like Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power. Today, the swashbuckler has practically gone the way of the musical or the Western, hardly ever showing up except for the occasional "Musketeer" or "Mask of Zorro." So, when such a film does come along that works as well as this one does and that generates as good box office as this one did, it's cause for minor celebration among those of us who continue to appreciate the genre.
The plot, a few major alternations to Dumas's original notwithstanding, concerns betrayal and revenge in early nineteenth-century France. The betrayal and its accompanying conditions occupy the first half of the film; the revenge occupies the last half. The hero of the story is one Edmond Dantes, a young, largely illiterate seaman, who is falsely accused of conspiracy with the followers of Napoleon and condemned to the dungeons of the Chateau d'If. Those who betray him are the Count Fernand Mondego, plus his old first mate and a local magistrate. The biggest modification to the first half of the story, by the way, is making Mondego a nobleman and Edmond's best friend. In the book, as I recall, Mondego is a fisherman and a casual acquaintance.
In any case, Edmond spends the next thirteen years in a dungeon, while his fiancée, Mercedes, thinking him dead, marries Fernand! While in prison, Edmond befriends an old warrior priest, the Abbé Faria, who teaches him to read and write and imparts to him all his knowledge of history, philosophy, science, and swordsmanship; and then, whilst dying, he tells Edmond of a fabulous treasure buried on the island of Monte Cristo. Edmond vows to escape d'If, find the treasure, and use the money to extract his revenge on those who sent him up. Now, it is in the second half of the story that the Dumas book lost me in the intricacies of its characters, schemes, and counterplots, but the movie simplifies it, condenses it, and tags on a new ending that I found wholly satisfactory and no more contrived or silly than Dumas's own.
OK, I know what you're thinking, especially if you've never read the novel or seen any of the prior film versions of it: What are the odds? Like, what are the odds that a person would have three or more people connive to frame him? What are the odds of being sent to a dark, dank dungeon and survive for thirteen years? What are the odds of meeting somebody there who tells you of a fortune in gold on the outside? What are the odds of escaping and finding the treasure? What are the odds once free of meeting up with and befriending a band of pirates; and saving a man's life who becomes your devoted servant for life; and never being recognized by former friends and connections? What can I say, except that the movie, it seems to me, actually has fewer of these rare chances and coincidences than the book has.
Still and all, when one watches a good swashbuckler, one never needs to ask about the odds. Odds? Forget about it. Instead, it's the acting, the direction, and the look of the film that carry the day; and 2002's "The Count of Monte Cristo" has all three elements in good working order. Let's start with the acting. Jim Caviezel stars as Edmond Dantes, and a finer hero you wouldn't want. His change from a naive, callow youth to a sophisticated, hardened, vengeance-obsessed gentleman is seamless and convincing, while our sympathies for him remain strong regardless of our feelings about his intentions. He does become, after all, a fellow who doesn't just want revenge, but an exquisite revenge. Death is too good for his betrayers; they must suffer as he suffered! Guy Pearce plays the treacherous Fernand Mondego, and again we couldn't ask for a better villain. Pearce is far more persuavive here as a dastard than he was as a hero in "The Time Machine," where he merely seemed awkward and ill-at-ease. As Fernand, Pearce is truly a scoundrel we love to hate.
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