Trivia / The Count of Monte Cristo (2002)

• California Doubling: Set primarily in France, the movie was shot entirely in Ireland and Malta. The Château D'If in Marseille scenes were actually made on Saint Mary's Tower on the island of Comino in Malta.
• Dawson Casting: A relatively mild example, with a 19-year-old Henry Cavill playing the 15-year-old Albert Mondego.
• Fake Nationality:
  • None of the principal cast is French.
  • Abbé Faria was Italian in the book, and the real-life historical figure he was loosely based on was Indian Portuguese. Neither of these things are Irish, which is what Richard Harris was in real life.
  • Jacopo is supposed to be some kind of Mediterranean sailor (Corsican in the book), but his actor is Puerto Rican.
• Focus Group Ending: Villefort is in the wagon and about to go to prison for life. The guard tells him that the gun on the seat was placed there as a "courtesy for a gentleman." The original version had the gun loaded, and he kills himself. The focus group didn't like that, feeling the gun should've been loaded with a blank and Villefort should've spent the rest of his life in that awful prison. The creators were taken aback, but they had the alternate take with the empty gun anyway, so all it took was a simple substitution to make the movie better.
• Follow the Leader: It was a part of a wave of modern swashbuckler films that updated classic stories following the success of Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and a little more directly by the even more recent success of The Mask of Zorro, which notably shared a number of similarities in its story with the book by Alexandre Dumas. Notably though Monte Cristo actually wound up having the same director as the former of the two films with Kevin Reynolds.
• He Also Did: Scriptwriter Jay Wolpert is more noted for having produced a handful of weird, yet fun, game shows.
• Older Than They Think: This adaptation wasn't the first to include the plot twist of Albert being Edmond's son, not Fernand's, a development that wasn't in the novel. It first showed up in an 1868 stage melodrama version of the novel that enjoyed much popularity.
• On-Set Injury: Jim Caviezel accidentally stabbed Guy Pearce during their fight scene. Caviezel was horrified but Pearce spent the rest of the shoot bragging about it to anyone who would listen.
• Separated-at-Birth Casting: With their pale complexions, dark hair, fine facial features, and bright blue eyes, Dagmara Domińczyk and Henry Cavill can certainly pass for mother and son (the Dawson and Underage Casting aspect aside). In-Universe, it helps Mercedes successfully hide Albert's true parentage from everyone, since he takes after her more than well enough that no one questions whether he's Fernand's son or not.

---