Screenwriter Jay Wolpert came up with the idea, not present in the novel, that Fernand Mondego (Guy Pearce) and Edmond Dantes (Jim Caviezel) started out as best friends. His logic was that it would work better as a "buddy" film that turned sinister. Wolpert believed that when a friendship soured, the hate generated was both more terrible and more believable.
The Count of Monte Cristo was one of Mark Twain's favorite books. When Twain toured Europe in 1867, he made a special stop to see the prison, Chateau D'if. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn contains a humorous spoof of Monte Cristo.
The encounter with Napoleon on Elba is a sequence created specifically for the film. Since the book begins with the Pharaon's return to Marseilles and Edmond recounting what happened, the filmmakers felt that actually showing the events was more cinematically interesting than Edmond just talking about them.
The movie was filmed in Malta and Ireland. Powerscourt House in County Wicklow stood in for the Parisian estate Dantes buys.
Kevin Reynolds enjoyed working with Helen McCrory, and was disappointed about having to delete a subplot involving Valentina in order to tighten the story pacing.