Count Of Monte Cristo Book Vs Movie

Douglas Horton once said, While seeking revenge, dig two graves - one for yourself. The novel version of The Count of Monte Cristo is a true masterpiece of revenge while the movie directed by Kevin Reynolds is more focused on other parts of the main character's life. Both are, none the less, very different but, great stories. During the time our class spent with the book, as well as, the movie most if not all students enjoyed both. However, this raises a question. Is the book or the movie better? The answer is that the book is better.
To answer this question we must delve into what the message of each story tells the person consuming the works. During the first hundred pages of the novel and the first fifty minutes we get a quick back story

Both works don’t focus much on Dangler and more on the infiltration and eventual takedown of Fernand. The book does have more on the kidnapping of Albert, Fernand son, who later in the movie is revealed to be Edmund’s son. Which was not a realistic happening since Mercedes most likely would have grieved before jumping into another man’s arms even if she says her son needed a father. In the movie the writers wanted the audience to hate Fernand with a passion while in the book, he was definitely in the wrong but, was a more gray area that makes some readers have somewhat pity for him and hope at least he will live. While in the movie he was basically a stereotypical evil villain that everyone hated with him sleeping around and killing people who wanted to defend their honor. The movie is not nearly as realistic everything in the real world is never cut and dry this is good this is evil. Even later on Edmund does do some stuff he shouldn’t have and didn’t worry about how it would impact the people around

The movie makes Dantes’ story more of a fairy tale and makes him end up with his old love, while in the book he falls for his slave girl which is more realistic and allows the reader to stay mad at his old love, Mercedes, for giving up on him not even knowing if he had died. The biggest problem with the movie is that it doesn’t seem like a revenge story, but rather something that is a love story with revenge hidden within the underlying story. In the book, Fernand, the antagonist loses his family and all his money in a humiliating way. By slowly taking money of his bank account for extremely overpriced food and drink while he is trapped in a dungeon. For the reader, this is a lot more satisfying than just seeing the guy die. Also, later on, we find out in the book by Edmunds actions he had accidentally killed a kid in the process of ruining the life of the investigator who wronged him. This makes him realize that he has to stop bring the revenge to an end and allow his spiritual “son,” Maximilien, to run away with his love which the movie entirely removes to save time, this is an extra story arch they completely cut even though the writers could have added another forty minutes of content to a just over two hours long