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There is nothing terribly wrong with Kevin Reynolds's The Count of Monte Cristo, which the Internet Movie Database lists as the 18th remake of Alexandre Dumas's tale of innocence betrayed and avenged. It is neither a drag nor a gas; it neither betrays its source material nor adheres too slavishly to the densely penned novel. It is hardly the best Monte Cristo(Rowland Lee's 1934 version, with Robert Donat as the vengeful Edmond Dantes, stands high atop the decaying heap) or the worst (the 1975 TV version, starring Richard Chamberlain, played like soap opera Masterpiece Theater). In all, it's a most competent film, which may not seem terribly high praise for a tale that's hard to mishandle, but Reynolds is, after all, the man who brought you Robin Hood: Prince of Thievesand Waterworld, two movies currently being screened for the eternally damned.

It's not completely fair to discard Reynolds's entire filmography, which includes 1985's Fandango and 1988's now-timely The Beast(based on William Mastrosimone's play about a Soviet tank soldier stranded in Afghanistan). It's long been said of Reynolds that his career was derailed by association with his onetime friend Kevin Costner. Reynolds was no match for Costner's rampaging ego, which ultimately ruined their friendship -- and, ultimately, Reynolds's films.

The Count of Monte Cristois, blessedly, Costner-free, and in his stead is Frequency's Jim Caviezel as Edmond Dantes, the sailor betrayed and imprisoned over nothing more than another man's desire to claim his woman. Novice screenwriter Jay Wolpert, better known as cocreator of The Price Is Rightand Match Game, has tweaked Dumas's tale and added an intriguing twist: Fernand Mondego (Memento's Guy Pearce), who barely knew Edmond in the novel, is now his best friend since childhood. When Fernand sells out Edmond to the complicit Villefort (James Frain), who jails Edmond in an island prison, he now does so out of a raging, long-simmering jealousy. "You're the son of a clerk," sneers the monied Fernand. "I'm not supposed to want to be you." (Pearce seems to think being covetous renders one a total bitch.) Fernand gets just what he wants: Edmond is banished to a lifetime of solitary confinement on France's Alcatraz, the Château d'If, and Edmond's true love, Mercedes (Dagmara Dominczyk), finds comfort in Fernand's waiting arms.

At the Château d'If, Edmond -- written off as dead by Mercedes, who has since married Fernand -- wastes away. But Edmond is not alone forever: A priest, Abbe Faria (Richard Harris), imprisoned for decades after refusing to turn over to Napoleon dozens of treasure chests filled with gold, tunnels through Edmond's floor and spends the next eternity (feels like it, anyway) teaching his young acolyte philosophy, economics, and swordplay -- the fine art of revenge. Harris plays the priest like Yoda on a decades-long bender; one expects Peter O'Toole to climb up the tunnel bearing dry martinis, though Harris's are the rare scenes full of vigor and wit. Otherwise, Caviezel is left to brood and seethe, plotting the comeuppance of those who done him wrong once he escapes The Rock, finds the gold, hooks up with his man-servant Jacopo (Luis Guzman, a wise-assed and welcome anachronism), and reinvents himself as one pissed-off belle of the ball.

Compared to last year's The Musketeer, a Dumas redo that clumsily retrofitted Hollywood storytelling with Hong Kong style, The Count of Monte Cristois positively elegant and dignified. But in the end, it's a film soshort on style and verve that it feels lifeless; audiences might feel imprisoned in the Château d'If, praying for escape or quick death. Thankfully, one need not tunnel out of a movie theater.