The Legend Of Zorro

The Legend of Zorro
Widescreen Special Edition
Antonio Banderas, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Rufus Sewell
Directed by Martin Campbell
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
130 minutes

All is not well in the de la Vega home in the second Antonio Banderas Catherine Zeta-Jones Zorro movie The Legend Of Zorro. Elena would like Don Diego to be a stay at home father while he still has a few wrongs to right as the legendary fox. This causes Elena to leave him and take up with French Count Armand (Rufus Sewell). Of course, nothing is quite what it seems to be which leads to a lot of action scenes that make The Legend Of Zorro a really fun to watch movie.

Both Zeta-Jones and Banderas are quite comfortable in their reprise of the roles they portrayed so well in The Mask Of Zorro. Although much of the humor is gone in this second installment, the many action scenes and a tighter plot make the second Zorro movie as enjoyable as the original. This time around, California is on the verge of joining the union but a bunch of bad guys part of a one-world organization want to sabotage that plan because they are afraid America is going to become too strong a country and end their movement’s influence. The now divorced Don Diego and Elena fight constantly while evil Count Armand plans to disrupt the building of the United States of America. Eventually, of course, Zorro steps in and rights all wrongs, including the conflict between Zeta-Jones and Banderas and, of course, all is well that ends well.

The Legend Of Zorro is an action-packed movie that is a lot more violent and a lot less tongue in cheek that its predecessor. There are still a few funny lines here and there like when an inebriated Don Diego comments on his wife leaving him, “Nobody leaves my tequila worm dangling in the wind.” but this second Zorro movie is a lot more concerned with the mystery of who are the bad guys, what are they up to, and why did Elena actually leave Don Diego. Comic relief is often provided by the de la Vega’s son (Adrian Alonso) who is a Zorro in waiting and manages to be a cute kid in a movie without being irritating.

Not everything is perfect in this second Zorro movie with Banderas and Zeta-Jones. Some of the matte paintings are really obvious and the final scene with the Count makes it so obvious a blue screen was used for the effect that it almost looks comical. Still, The Legend Of Zorro is great fun.

Special features include the usual director and cinematographer commentary. Also included are deleted scenes, four behind the scenes featurettes: stunts, visual effects, Armand’s party, and playing with trains. There are also two multi-angle scene deconstructions.

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