Adventure movies almost always strike us as throwbacks to an earlier era
of filmmaking, the era of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and The Great Train
Robbery. For every moviegoer, there seems to be an archetypal memory of
some rip-roaring yarn from their youth--a movie that defines the adventure
of the movies themselves. For me, it was The Mark of Zorro, which I
saw at a drive-in theater when I was 8 or 9. The grace of Tyrone Power and
the evil Basil Rathbone made such an impression on me that ever since, I've
been subconsciously comparing all subsequent adventures to this one
movie.
That's why The Mask of Zorro, the latest movie version of the
Zorro legend, strikes a deep chord in me. Now this is a movie, I
feel in my bones, as I watch Zorro dispatch Spanish flunkies with a witty
flourish. Minimally updated with modern filmmaking techniques, The Mask
of Zorro relies chiefly on the tried-and-true staples of swordplay,
stunts, and leading-man charisma (adding only the occasional massive
explosion so we'll know we're in the '90s). And with swooningly romantic
Antonio Banderas and arrestingly intense Anthony Hopkins as the leads, the
movie catches fire long before evil Stuart Wilson lights any fuses.
The Mask of Zorro is also a throwback in the sense that it has
plenty of plot to sustain and drive the action. Hopkins plays the original
Zorro, Diego de la Vega, whose fight for the peasants of Mexico lands him
in jail as the movie opens. Just before Diego is imprisoned, the Spanish
governor Raphael Montero kills his wife and takes his baby daughter. Twenty
years later, as Montero lands on the shores of California to start a new
kingdom on the backs of enslaved peasants, Diego escapes. To save the
Californians and to take his revenge, he takes as a pupil Alejandro
(Banderas), a thief whose brother was killed by an American cavalry captain
in league with Montero.
The brief training sequences reveal the sheer star power of the two
leading men: Hopkins with his interior brooding and Banderas with his
rambunctious athleticism both exhibit perfect control over their physical
screen presence. In an extended scene at a party in Montero's mansion,
Banderas turns on the blinding full wattage of his allure to seduce the
villain's daughter Elena, played by the ravishing Catherine Zeta-Jones,
while Hopkins, barely in focus in the background, still commands our
attention with the merest flick of his eyes.
There are some narrow escapes that stretch credibility, and the pacing
leading up to the final battle occasionally falters. But in an age when
stars too often act by goggling at invisible computer graphics, there's
something deeply satisfying about watching acrobatics on horseback at a
full gallop. And most satisfying of all is the appearance of actors with
that old-time star quality--actors whom woman want and men want to be. May
The Mask of Zorro spawn a thousand throwback projects, and may
Banderas long reign as king of the masked men.
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