Review: The Count of Monte Cristo

In the early 1800s, Sidney Blackmer’s dastardly Count Fernand de Mondego lusts after Mercedes (Elissa Lanndi), the fiancé of Edmond Dantes (Robert Donat), the first officer of a French merchant ship. The captain of the ship (Lawrence Grant) is handed a letter from the exiled Napoleon, and at the moment of his death he hands this letter to Dantes. City magistrate Raymond de Villefort (Louis Calhern) realises that his father – the aforementioned ship’s captain – has aided the exiled Napoleon, and conspires to frame Dantes for the crime instead. He does this with the cooperation of the scheming Count and a third man named Danglars (Raymond Walburn), the ship’s ambitious second officer. Dantes is jailed, and an unawares Mercedes ends up married to the Count, having been told that Dantes died in prison. O.P. Heggie plays Dantes’ only company in his island prison stay. There Dantes stews and seethes for years, planning his revenge.

 

A top-drawer cast delivers in this classic 1934 screen adaptation of the Alexandre Dumas novel by director Rowland V. Lee (“Son of Frankenstein”, “Tower of London”) and his co-writers Philip Dunne (“How Green Was My Valley”), and Dan Totheroh (“The Dawn Patrol”, “The Devil and Daniel Webster”). Out of the three adaptations I’ve seen (the others being the Richard Chamberlain and Jim Caviezel-starring versions), they’re all good but this one in particular landed well for me. Lead actor Robert Donat is the perfect sympathetic romantic hero, Sidney Blackmer and Louis Calhern are perfect as the villains who have wronged him. O.P. Heggie is perfect casting in the exact role you expect the blind man from “Bride of Frankenstein” to play here. It’s a terrific character performance and a larger role than he had in that iconic horror film. Elissa Landi may not be the most glamorous actress of the 1930s but she’s extremely likeable as our leading lady. I particularly loved the bit where her character either realises Donat’s true identity or at least is overwhelmed by a strong sense of familiarity. Donat for his part does a great job differentiating between Dantes and The Count, despite them looking pretty much the same. So you don’t feel Landi and others are too stupid for being slow to catch on. I also appreciated the fun, Nigel Bruce-esque turn by Raymond Walburn as the third and least menacing conspirator. Walburn gets to be the scenery-chewing, comic fool villain whereas Blackmer and Calhern are much more serious and grounded as scheming bastards. Mitchell Lewis does solid work as smuggler ship captain Vampa, and Lawrence Grant is equally good as Calhern’s father.

 

It’s quite a lovely production for 1934 with several memorable moments. I particularly loved the bit where a jailed Donat dreams about Landi and broods about Calhern and Blackmer as the latter two walk right into the camera lens “Cape Fear”-style. Plausible or not the courtroom finale is an absolute cracker. They just don’t make ‘em like this anymore.

 

A classic story about justice classically told, I only wish I’d seen it much, much sooner. This is terrific storytelling. It’s an absolute crime this film didn’t receive any Oscar nominations. In addition to Best Picture, I think Donat, Heggie, and Blackmer were extremely unlucky to miss out on acting nominations. See this if you haven’t, it’s one of the best films of its type and one of the best films of the entire 1930s.  

 

Rating: B+

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