Scaramouche

"He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad." Thus opens Rafael Sabatini's historical novel on which this fanciful film is based, following the sensational exploits of a young lawyer thrown into the tumult of the French Revolution. There he becomes an actor portraying the celebrated character Scaramouche, a chameleon who plays both rogue and fool. First published in 1921, it became an instant bestseller, flying onto the stage and then to film in just over two years. Silent film heartthrob Ramon Navarro embodies the enigmatic, charasmatic Andre-Louis Moreau, caught up in the romance and fury of times. Upon release, audiences were gripped by Navarro's electrifying performance, deftly navigating between proletariat and revolutionary, love and despair, cynic and idealist. Vive Le France! Vive Scaramouche!

This silent era classic was based on the swashbuckling adventure novel by Rafael Sabatini, the author whose works later inspired such renowned genre favorites as CAPTAIN BLOOD (1935) and THE SEA HAWK (1940). Andre Moreau (Roman Novarro) is a law student during the time of the brewing French Revolution who politically supports his dissatisfied fellow citizens. During a confrontation with the Marquis de la Tour d'Azyr (Lewis Stone), a feared nobleman sympathetic to the royalist cause, the blue blood murders Andre's agitator friend. Unable to engage in swordplay against the legendary prowess of the Marquis, Andre vows revenge and joins a local circus troupe, hiding behind the guise of Scaramouche, a clown, while training in the art of fencing with a master. Andre also falls in love with a woman smitten by the dashing Marquis, but she returns to the troupe when she learns of the nobleman's infidelity. As political unrest boils over into rebellion, Moreau and the Marquis cross steel. SCARAMOUCHE (1923) was remade often, most notably in 1952, which features the cinema's longest sword battle and costarred Stone in a different role.