Product: The Musketeer (2001)
Rating: 3.0
Remember the Ritz Brothers's version?
Please, get off your serious Leonard Maltin high jackasses and enjoy yourselves. This film bears no resemblance to any of Dumas' works, nor any of the earlier film versions (at least 7), which were tailored either to the leading man/lady or the director's whimsy. I really enjoyed all the crazy swordplay, being a Jackie Chan fan. The homage to Shanghai Noon, with flying ladders and wild-eyed, one eyed villain, was great fun.Richard Lester's classic retelling starred English and American actors, none of whom had French accents, and it was not harmed by the Cockney-speaking peasants either. Les Mis doesn't have the first glimmer of a French accent, and it was written in French! Lighten up!When such divers actors as Gene Kelly, Lana Turner, The Ritz Brothers and Chris O'Donnell get away with making films titled The Three Musketeers, no one is in a position to complain when Peter Hyams borrows a familiar character to spin a new tale. Read the entire Three Musketeers trilogy by Dumas (3M, Twenty Years Later, Ten Years After) and don't look for much, if any, resemblance to the celluloid versions.The scruffy costumes of the disenfranchised Musketeers, the elaborate court dress, and the (back to Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon) use of torches and candles to light indoor scenes was useful window dressing, but who really cares if it was filmed in Luxembourg, France or Grand Fenwick?I was amused but not impressed. But I have seen a lot worse films with bigger stars and more ambitious plots. (Rhymes with plotz, which would be Dumas' reaction to all these films).