The Man in the Iron Mask is a pic so derivative of history and cinema, so that it comes off as an overlong, slow-moving cheap pic with overstuffed costumes, a cliched script and bad acting.
It is very loosely based off of the novel the Vicomte de Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas. The story is set in France, where France is under the tyrannic reign of the young King Louis XIV. After he falls for the young Christine (Judith Godreche), who is engaged to the young Raoul (Peter Sarsgaard). Wanting her desperately, Louis has Raoul placed in the frontlines on a battlefield, where he is killed by cannons in a suicidal charge. This infuriates Raoul's father, Athos (John Malkovich), who is also one of the legendery Three Musketeers). Taking up arms with his former comrades, Aramis (Jeremy Irons) and Porthos (Gerard Depardieu), Athos plots to overthrow the King Louis. When Athos' attempt to kill Louis fails, Aramis decides to break the Man in the Iron Mask out of prison, a man who's face has never been seen to anyone, locked in a mask of iron, and placed in dungeon. After breaking him out of jail, it is revealed that his man is in fact Philippe, the twin brother of Louis, and the Musketeers begin their plot to replace Louis with him to restore France to it's former glory and to change the course of history.
This is a film on epic proportions. Sadly though, I can't even begin to explain about how bad the acting really was. Both DiCaprio and Malkovich, in my opinion, are qualified, accomplished and fine actors. Up until now, I haven't seen a movie where either of them has given a poor performance. Until now. DiCaprio speaks in an American accent (and he's a French king), Malkovich alternates between a French and and American accent, and all of the other actors speak in American, English or a light French accent.
The script is too cliched for an epic movie like this. The acting qualities of this film that I talked about in the paragraph above are mixed in with the script to make the film cartoonish.
Cartoonish. That could sum up the Man in the Iron Mask all in one word. This is yet another sorrowful pic, sorrowful because I saw a lot of potential to be a good movie: the plot was engaging and the good guys were likeable. And yet, it so easily squandered that potential without effort.
**/5
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