How others will see it. This rousing version of the literary classic is too plotty for its own good, and the characters and their ever-changing relationships are not easy to follow. The attempts at comic relief provide mixed success: the Marquis evaluations and rejects a flirtatious peasant girl (works); Moreau has a foolish judge look at his ugly face in the mirror (doesn't work).
The great ironies of the film (more on this later) will be ignored by most viewers. Instead, the highs and lows of our hero, always virtuous, brave, and handsome, will be their focus. Since his adventures are varied, entertaining, and not quite predictable, most will enjoy this film. Most, that is, who seek out silent films, since the typical moviegoer views such cinema as a flawed curiousity filled with hammy acting and excessive makeup.
How I felt about it. First of all, hats off the devoted folks who restored this deserving lost relic. The dancing dots and cloudiness typical of many silent films are largely absent.
Now for the ironies. These exist on a personal level for our hero, but are also present from a class perspective. As class is of greater interest, this is discussed first.
It seems obvious that revolution made things worse. Admittedly, acts of repression and injustice, as well as vast economic differences between immobile classes, were by no means ideal. But, such a system is stable, and preferable to mob rule, with its associated mass murder, lawlessness, and economic destruction. Not to mention the wars it caused between Franch and other countries, who were eager to contain the cancer (from their point of view) of revolution to the geographic boundaries of France.
Other ironies mostly involve our hero Novarro and his relationship to his arch-enemy, the Marquis. These consist of soap opera-style revelations that you will probably determine in advance.
Although the plot is burdened from novel condensation, to the smaller visage of the movie screen. Some laughers are noteworthy: an unrecorded speech given a year prior to a handful of people is said to have the people of Paris primed for revolution. Danton is shown first as an oratorical hero of the people, then as a pied piper to a murderous mob. Moreau, with no theatrical experience, becomes the leading playwright and thespian of France within a year.
Scaramouche was based on a novel by Italian author Rafael Sabatani, who was still alive when several works of his became big budget Hollywood swashbuckler epics: The Sea Hawk, Captain Blood, and The Black Swan.