You'd have a difficult time recognizing this as the same story that the 1952 version was built around. I read the novel when I was a kid but can't say how closely either version sticks to the book. All I remember of the novel is that Rafael Sabatini didn't know anything about fencing.
In 1952, Stewart Granger was Andre Moreau. His best friend, a social activist in pre-revolutionary France, is killed by an aristocrat who is a deadly swordsman, Mel Ferrer. The remainder of the movie has Granger on the run from the authorities, disguising himself as a comic figure in a traveling troupe, having an affair with one of the players, falling for a rich and delicate young lady, putting Herculean efforts into learning how to fence, and finally beating Mel Ferrer in a duel but allowing him to live.
I don't mean to carry on at too much length about the 1952 version but it's probably more familiar to viewers than the 1923 silent, with Ramon Navarro as the hero, Andre. After a few similarities in the first half hour, the plots pretty much diverge.
This version is at least equally expensive and it's well done for the time, but the emphasis is placed far more on politics than comedy or swordsmanship.
Here, Andre spends hardly any time playing Scaramouche on stage. We see him in costume for about two minutes, and he does nothing that convinces us he's a comic genius. In 1952, Granger knows nothing of the sword at first and has three encounters with Ferrer, the last one rolling, or rather tumbling along in a theater for about fifteen minutes. What a duel! As well done any any other I've seen on the screen, about as good as that in "The Mark of Zorro", but more lavishly staged and more extended. In 1923, Navarro also doesn't know anything about fencing but we see him taking a lesson for about one minute, after which he is an unbeatable master of the weapon.
The 1923 climax has nothing to do with a duel between the hero and the chief heavy. It has to do with the French revolution, into which Navarro has been swept up. The French nobility were bad enough, you know. "Let them eat cake!" All the noblesse and none of the oblige.
But, caramba, the mob that took over was crazed and drunk and given to beheading everybody they could get their hands on. Not only did King Louis XVI get the guillotine but so did Robespierre, one of the fomenters of the revolution. Not that you see any executions in the film, just the outraged savages doing what outraged savages always do in these movies -- smash furniture.
Anyway, the climax is shifted from a duel mano a mano to the epic story of the revolution and its immediate aftermath.
This isn't a bad film, but I prefer the remake -- one of the rare times when the second version is as good, or better, than the original. It just happens to be one of those stories that benefit from OverwhelmoColor and sound. In 1952, the tinks of the metal swords meeting were created by the tinkling of crystal glass. The 1923 is good; the 1952 is phenomenal.
In 1952, Stewart Granger was Andre Moreau. His best friend, a social activist in pre-revolutionary France, is killed by an aristocrat who is a deadly swordsman, Mel Ferrer. The remainder of the movie has Granger on the run from the authorities, disguising himself as a comic figure in a traveling troupe, having an affair with one of the players, falling for a rich and delicate young lady, putting Herculean efforts into learning how to fence, and finally beating Mel Ferrer in a duel but allowing him to live.
I don't mean to carry on at too much length about the 1952 version but it's probably more familiar to viewers than the 1923 silent, with Ramon Navarro as the hero, Andre. After a few similarities in the first half hour, the plots pretty much diverge.
This version is at least equally expensive and it's well done for the time, but the emphasis is placed far more on politics than comedy or swordsmanship.
Here, Andre spends hardly any time playing Scaramouche on stage. We see him in costume for about two minutes, and he does nothing that convinces us he's a comic genius. In 1952, Granger knows nothing of the sword at first and has three encounters with Ferrer, the last one rolling, or rather tumbling along in a theater for about fifteen minutes. What a duel! As well done any any other I've seen on the screen, about as good as that in "The Mark of Zorro", but more lavishly staged and more extended. In 1923, Navarro also doesn't know anything about fencing but we see him taking a lesson for about one minute, after which he is an unbeatable master of the weapon.
The 1923 climax has nothing to do with a duel between the hero and the chief heavy. It has to do with the French revolution, into which Navarro has been swept up. The French nobility were bad enough, you know. "Let them eat cake!" All the noblesse and none of the oblige.
But, caramba, the mob that took over was crazed and drunk and given to beheading everybody they could get their hands on. Not only did King Louis XVI get the guillotine but so did Robespierre, one of the fomenters of the revolution. Not that you see any executions in the film, just the outraged savages doing what outraged savages always do in these movies -- smash furniture.
Anyway, the climax is shifted from a duel mano a mano to the epic story of the revolution and its immediate aftermath.
This isn't a bad film, but I prefer the remake -- one of the rare times when the second version is as good, or better, than the original. It just happens to be one of those stories that benefit from OverwhelmoColor and sound. In 1952, the tinks of the metal swords meeting were created by the tinkling of crystal glass. The 1923 is good; the 1952 is phenomenal.