The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan
(Les trois mousquetaires: D’Artagnan)
Très très bien! The new Musketeers movie is a lot of fun, relishing the action and using locations which we haven’t seen before. It seems to follow the original Dumas story more.
The main characters all (apart from the King and Queen) have dodgy costumes, which run from the 17th century and veer more to the 18th/19th century. Background extras are magnifique, especially the Cardinal and judges. I enjoyed all the political machinations in the background, including the reluctant and cynical bridegroom (brother to the King) and Eva Best’s Milady is exquisitely, elegantly nasty, and the whole look of it — really different to what we’ve seen before, much less corny and cartoony. Vincent Cassel — need I say more?
It is a hard watch (both the English and Protestants are the enemy here), but culture wincing aside, there is sword fighting; epic perilous horse chases across cliff tops and across country; super loud pistols and muskets; political machinations and faction forming, even within the royal family. What the film does do is make the character of the King much more complex to match the Queen (and a King who is trying to do the right thing); throw in the political maneuverings of his more charismatic brother and mother, and get Constance involved in overhearing how probably the Cardinal is seeking to control them all through events, and create another religious civil war. The Queen also has a nice line in ‘if the King wishes it, then it will be so’, (yet can also challenge the King when needed), and the King has a thinking ‘tell’ as he decides what to do. Not so much a weak King here as a man who doesn’t think he’s good enough to be King.
Apart from being the villain in the piece, my only other quibble is with the historical costuming itself. Very much going for the look of BBC’s The Musketeers and then accelerating, D’Artagnan’s linen remains filthy dirty throughout (even when he’s not being buried alive) — surely to Constance’s shame, and his own. Everyone seems to be clothed in shades of mud and never wash, looking really crushed and creased — even the royals are drab, in 2020s greys, lacking the lace, sumptuous cloth, jewels and other fripperies of this era. But most men do have facial hair and jaunty hats with a feather in, the ladies hair is heading towards frizzled, the masked ball was superbe — really gorgeously done, decadent and magic making, and to have the Duke of Buckingham wearing the royal diamonds, ripe for seduction! captured the male peacocking of the age brilliantly. The King has great hair! the Queen has an awesome drapery and the royal wedding was beautifully portrayed, not to mention the musketeer solidarity in lines of linked arms as the musketeers gave a salute to Athos. It was intriguing to see how the French and English royal families all looked so similar at this time — Charles II and Louis XIV were basically twinning, although this is set before their times!) There are great set shots such as lines of black and white horses merging together and it’s a bit of a detective story too as D’Artagnan and the Musketeers unpick a crime scene.
Overall, lots of zest and excitement, epic action and gusto, I really enjoyed un pour tous et tous pour un. Though this is only Part 1 — Part 2 dépêchez-vous!
