Plot
The film is based on the story The Curse of Capistrano written by Johnston McCulley, originally published in 1919, which introduced the masked hero Zorro. The story is set in Southern California during the early 19th century. The plot deals with Don Diego Vega (Tyrone Power), the apparently foppish son of wealthy ranchero Don Alejandro Vega (Montagu Love), who returns to California after his education in Spain. He is horrified at the way the common people are mistreated by alcalde Luis Quintero (J. Edward Bromberg). Don Diego adopts the guise of El Zorro ("the fox"), a masked outlaw who becomes the defender of the common people. Meanwhile, he romances the Alcalde's beautiful niece, Lolita (Linda Darnell). He simultaneously flirts with the Alcalde's wife Inez (Gale Sondergaard), filling her head with tales of Madrid fashion and culture and raising her desire to move there with her corrupt husband. In both his guises, Don Diego has to contend with the governor's ablest henchman, the malevolent Captain Pasquale (Basil Rathbone).
The film features a climactic duel between Zorro and Pasquale. Rathbone was known already in Hollywood as an outstanding classical fencer, but Power's own excellent skills are displayed here for the first time. The duel is ornate and full of subtlety, as opposed to Rathbone's duel with Errol Flynn in The Adventures of Robin Hood, and the duel in The Mark of Zorro is considered by many movie buffs to be the finest swordfight in cinema. Staged by Hollywood's resident fencing master Fred Cavens and atmospherically shot by cinematographer Arthur Miller and director Rouben Mamoulian, the scene takes place in a single room and forces actors to fight rather than jump around in the scenery. In key shots, Cavens' son, Albert, doubles for Power (such as the shot where he plunges his saber through the bookcase). Scenes of fast fencing were undercranked to 18-20 frames per second, requiring that all the sound for the scene be post-synchronized. Rathbone suffered two scratches on his forehead during its filming, and later said of Power, "He could fence Errol Flynn into a cocked hat."
Read more about this topic: The Mark Of Zorro (1940 film)
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