The Legend of Zorro

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The Legend of Zorro
Promotional poster for Legend of Zorro
Directed by	Martin Campbell
Produced by	Steven Spielberg Roger Birnbaum Gary Barber
Written by	Screenplay: Roberto Orci Alex Kurtzman Story: Ted Elliott Terry Rossio Roberto Orci Alex Kurtzman
Starring	Antonio Banderas Catherine Zeta-Jones Rufus Sewell
Music by	James Horner
Editing by	Stuart Baird
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures Spyglass Entertainment
Release date(s)	October 28, 2005
Running time	130 min
Language	English
Budget	$80 million
Preceded by	The Mask of Zorro
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

The Legend of Zorro is a 2005 sequel to 1998's The Mask of Zorro, both directed by Martin Campbell. Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones reprise their roles as the titular hero and his spouse, and Rufus Sewell stars as the villain. The film, which supposedly takes place in San Mateo County, California, was shot in Mexico and in Wellington, New Zealand. It premiered in movie theaters three years after the Disney Channel stopped telecasting its classic 1950s TV series Zorro with Guy Williams as Don Diego de la Vega/Zorro.

[edit] Plot summary

The plot summary in this article or section is too long or detailed compared to the rest of the article. Please edit the article to focus on discussing the work rather than merely reiterating the plot.

In 1850, the people of California were voting to decide whether or not to join the United States. During one of the votes, a wild gunsman named Jacob McGivens attacks to steal the box of votes. Before he makes off with the votes however, Zorro, who has been protecting the people of California for the past ten years, appears and chases after him and his men. Zorro succeeds in recapturing the votes and fights off all of McGivens men. When McGivens attacks, he succeeds in pulling off Zorro's mask, but Zorro manages to knock him out before he sees his face. Just then a pair of spies, the Pinkertons, see the face of Zorro, recognizing him as Don Alejandro de la Vega. Zorro then makes a make-shift mask out of his costume and rides off on his black stallion, Toronado, to deliver the votes to the governor.

Upon returning to his mansion, Alejandro is greeted by his loving wife, Elena. Elena believes that Alejandro can now give up being Zorro, but Alejandro is not so sure that the people will no longer need him. Angered, Elena kicks Alejandro out of the house. The next day, after sending her now 10-year-old son, Joaquin to school, Elena is confronted by the Pinkertons, who reveal that they know who Zorro really is. Soon after, Alejandro is served with divorce papers from Elena. Three months later, Alejandro is living in a hotel, having not been summoned as Zorro in all this time. His friend and childhood guardian, Father Felipe, convinces him to attend a party at a French count's new vineyard and there Alejandro finds out that Elena has been spending time with the count, Armand, revealed to be a schoolmate of Elena's. Later, after drinking himself crazy, Alejandro watches an explosion go off close to Armand's mansion and becomes suspicious of his ex-wife's long-time friend.

Afterwards, McGivens and his men attack a peasant family, the Cortezes, with whom Alejandro is friends. McGivens, siding with Armand, wants to buy their land to build a railroad, but the husband, Guillermo, refuses and Zorro arrives to stop McGivens. He succeeds in rescuing Guillermo's wife, Blanca, and infant son, José, but McGivens shoots Guillermo just before disappearing with his gang, the deed to the Cortez home in hand. Zorro then stakes McGivens out at Armand's mansion to confirm his suspicions and finds out that he is working for Armand and that the mansion is awash with Confederate soldiers. He then chases after McGivens to a shore where the count's cargo is being delivered. Thanks to Joaquin, who nearly gets himself killed when he goes after McGivens and his gang, Alejandro, hidden beneath Zorro's mask, rescues his son from danger. Luckily, Joaquin saved a bar of soap from one of Armand's cargo boxes and unknowingly shows it to his father. Together with this evidence, Felipe and Alejandro learn that Armand is part of a secret society, the Knights of Aragon, headed by a corrupt Confederate Army officer, Colonel Beauregard, who plans to conquer the Union States.

Sometime later, Alejandro is captured by the two Pinkertons and is told that they blackmailed Elena into divorcing him and getting close to Armand to find out his plans. Joaquin stumbles onto his father's whereabouts and frees him from prison after a run-in with several guards. Zorro then heads over to Armand's mansion, while Elena also arrives there and follows Armand to his secret lair. She then attacks the guards, but is outnumbered. Luckily Zorro arrives and they fight off all the guards. They then eavesdrop on Armand and Beauregard's meeting and learn that the soap bars are actually used to create nitroglycerin, which they plan to distribute throughout the Confederate army to destroy the Union. After confessing her involvement with the Pinkertons and that the divorce was fake, Elena then heads back to the mansion before Armand gets back and Zorro prepares to destroy the train carrying all of the explosive. McGivens meanwhile arrives at Felipe's church and shoots the priest as he tries to fight back. He also kidnaps Joaquin.

At the mansion, Armand reveals to Elena that he knows of her deceit when he presents to her the pigeon that she used to inform the Pinkletons as their dinner and she later discovers the two Pinkletons dead in a closet. Armand then captures Elena, as McGivens arrives with Joaquin, informing the Count of Felipe's death and that Zorro's son is a witness. Zorro then lights a fuse that will destroy the train and seemingly disappears into the night with his horse, Toronado. But after seeing Armand, Elena, and Joaquin approaching the train, he runs back and stops the fuse at the last second. McGivens then captures Zorro and unmasks him in front of everyone, including Joaquin. Armand then leaves on the train with Elena and Joaquin, giving McGivens the order to kill Alejandro. Before he can however, Felipe arrives and helps Alejandro fight McGivens. He eventually is killed when a drop of nitro lands on his head and explodes. Felipe then reveals that his crucifix around his neck shielded him from McGivens' bullet and Alejandro goes to save Elena and Joaquin.

Zorro saves a young girl from certain death. This shot, which is reminiscent of a scene from Spider-Man 2, appears in the film's trailer and the DVD menu but not the film itself.

The next morning, Zorro catches up to the train on Toronado. After a long chase, Toronado lands on top of the train and into the cargo car just as it approaches a tunnel. Zorro then makes his way to the passenger car and engages Armand in a sword fight. Meanwhile, Elena has Joaquin escape on Toronado to stop the train and then fights Armand's butler in the Nitro storage car, eventually stuffing a bottle of Nitro into him and pushes him off the train just as it approaches its rendezvous point with Colonel Beauregard. The butler lands in front of Beauregard and explodes, killing them both. Further along the tracks, the governor is signing the bill that will make California a state and a crowd are witnessing it. As the train gets closer, Joaquin has Toronado hit a track switch, causing the train pass around the governor's car. Zorro and Armand's duel takes them from the passenger car, to the locomotive, and to the very front. Zorro is incapacitated for a short time, which Armand uses to attempt to stab him, but Elena blocks him and the two have a short fight. Zorro wakes up and sees a large pile of rails blocking the end of the track. Zorro attacks Armand and hooks him to the front of the train. Zorro then uses his whip and swings to safety with Elena. Armand notices the railblock too late and is killed when the train plows him into the block. The crash causes the train to stop quickly, in turn, causing the nitro to explode, destroying the entire train. The governor later finishes the bill and California becomes the 31st state of America.

Later, Felipe remarries Alejandro and Elena with Joaquin as the only witness. Elena then allows Alejandro to continue being Zorro, accepting that it is who he is, and Zorro rides off on Toronado into the sunset.

[edit] Main cast

[edit] Historical and cultural references

The Legend of Zorro features a fictional monument called Bear Point, commemorating the site where the original Bear Flag of the California Republic flew briefly in 1846. Although the actual flag flew in Sonoma County, the film suggests that Bear Point is located in San Mateo County.

The Legend of Zorro continues its predecessor's inclusion of historical elements of California history into the fiction, though many liberties have been taken. Alejandro, the Mexican-born Californian who became Zorro at the end of The Mask of Zorro, is a fictional brother to Joaquin Murrieta, for whom the character's son Joaquin is named. Military governor Bennet Riley, the last of California's heads of state prior to statehood, is portrayed, but the Maryland-born American is played by the Mexican actor Pedro Armendáriz Jr., and speaks English with a Hispanic accent. Leo Burmester plays P. G. T. Beauregard, a Confederate general, whose character is killed during the film's climax. And Pedro Mira plays pre-presidential Abraham Lincoln as an observer to California's statehood, though the real Lincoln never travelled to the region.

The Legend of Zorro, which takes place in 1850, includes a significant number of deviations from history, particularly in depicting an organized Confederate States of America and a (presumably, though this is not explicitly stated) completed First Transcontinental Railroad, each more than a decade before their times. Furthermore, a deleted scene on the film's DVD features a short discussion on a magic lantern presentation.

The film also contains a number of references to other films. The plot bears a striking resemblance to that of Notorious, in which a deadly explosive is similarly concealed in wine bottles. Alejandro, whose surname was Murrieta in the original, has changed his name to de la Vega, the surname of the original Zorro, Don Diego de la Vega, who in turn was Elena's father. Zorro conceals his costume under a priest's robes, a tactic used in numerous Zorro-related works including its immediate predecessor. One character says of Zorro's mask: "This belongs in a museum... and so do you," a textual homage to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. (Zorro's use of a whip for combat and acrobatics inspired Jones'). And during the prison escape, Zorro disarms two swordsmen only to have a third flee in terror in a scene reminiscent of one from The Princess Bride. (Westley's disguise in that film was a near-copy of the Zorro costume.) Furthermore, actors Tony Amendola and Pedro Armendariz Jr. were also in The Mask of Zorro, though their characters were not the same ones they play in this film.

[edit] Critical reception

Unlike the critically acclaimed The Mask of Zorro, The Legend of Zorro was given mixed reviews, scoring a 47 from Metacritic and a 25% fresh rating from Rotten Tomatoes. Mick Lasalle of the San Francisco Chronicle called it "not remotely enjoyable"^[1], and Roger Ebert bemoaned that "of all of the possible ideas about how to handle the Elena character, this movie has assembled the worst ones."^[2] Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com, however, lauded it as "almost shamefully entertaining, bold and self-effacing at once", noting the civic and parental questions it raises.^[3] Slate Magazine critic David Edelstein concurred, praising Banderas and Zeta-Jones as "drop-dead-gorgeous movie stars and spectacular clowns." ^[4] Fans of the first film heavily criticized the relative lack of action. Both critics and admirers agreed that the film was aimed at younger audiences than was The Mask of Zorro.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Official Site
• Legend of Zorro (2005) at the Internet Movie Database
• Slant Magazine Film Review by Keith Uhlich