Review: The Three Musketeers

Brave young D’Artagnan (Chris O’Donnell) aspires to be a musketeer like his deceased father. Unfortunately, now isn’t seemingly the best time to become a musketeer. That’s because the scheming Cardinal Richelieu (Tim Curry), advisor to the naïve King Louis XIII (Hugh O’Conor) has disbanded the musketeers in his plans to ultimately end up on the throne with the beautiful and innocent Queen Anne (Gabrielle Anwar) by his side. So when D’Artagnan arrives in Paris, not only is he informed of the bad news, he also gets on the wrong side of three recently unemployed musketeers (to the point of them individually challenging the cocky young swordsman to a duel. Those musketeers are godly ladies man Aramis (Charlie Sheen), brooding Athos (Kiefer Sutherland), and fun-loving braggart Porthos (Oliver Platt). However, before the duels can take place, the foursome are set-upon by some of the Cardinal’s guards. Eventually the three musketeers decide to join forces with the kid (whose sword-fighting skills prove impressive) in thwarting the Cardinal’s plot, which involves the mysterious Milady De Winter (Rebecca De Mornay).

Every generation seems to have its own version of the Alexandre Dumas tale, and I guess this 1993 version from director Stephen Herek (“Critters”, “The Mighty Ducks”) and screenwriter David Loughery (“The Good Son”, “Lakeview Terrace”) was my generation’s version. A cross between “Young Guns” and “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves” (and a better film than the latter IMHO) and made for Disney, it’s an enjoyably light-hearted affair that for me is one of the two best screen versions of the tale, alongside the 1948 version with Gene Kelly and Vincent Price (I like the first two Richard Lester 1970s “Musketeers” films, but they’re a touch overrated). Nearly an hour shorter than “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves”, this one’s easy, breezy fun from start to finish with a rock-solid cast featuring a few standout performances.

Top honours clearly go to Tim Curry and Oliver Platt as, respectively, Cardinal Richelieu and Porthos who get 90% of the film’s best lines. Given they’re both hammy portrayals of villains, it’s easy to compare Curry’s Richelieu to the late Alan Rickman’s Sheriff of Nottingham in “Prince of Thieves”, but they’re clearly not the same character or performance. Curry’s performance for instance, contains a lot more comedy because the film itself is a bit lighter in tone (not that “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves” was a dark, dour drama like “Precious” or anything. It was still a fun romp in its own right, but nearly epic-length). Curry is endless fun here; Scheming, power-hungry, insincere, lecherous, and gleefully evil without being terrifying for the kiddies (No mean feat given this is the same guy who terrified my generation as children as Pennywise the Clown in the terrific miniseries “IT”). His best non-comedic moments are his creepy, leering interactions with Gabrielle Anwar’s young Queen. Oliver Platt very nearly steals the film from Curry as the portly, bragging storyteller musketeer Porthos. He looks to be having more of a fun time here than just about anyone not named Tim Curry, and playing the fun-loving, cheeky Porthos it’s quite appropriate for that to be the case. Most of the rest of the cast acquit themselves pretty nicely, too. Michael Wincott might again bring up memories of “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves” given he played henchman Guy of Gisbourne there and plays Rochefort, the ‘Living Blade’ of the Cardinal here. However, the two characters and performances aren’t identical. Wincott gives an excellent, black-hearted, black-hatted performance, and he does a spot-on English accent to my ears, too (Playing a Frenchman, mind you…). I probably prefer Christopher Lee in the Richard Lester trilogy, but Wincott is definitely the next-best Rochefort (He gets a great last line, too). Rebecca De Mornay is perfectly cast as the seductive, black widow-esque Milady De Winter. The character has a bit more complexity to her than The Cardinal and Rochefort, but she’s still incredibly icy and treacherous. Any hint of sympathy here is a mere trap she’s setting you up for. She’s definitely comparable to the excellent previous portrayals of the character by Angela Lansbury in the 1948 version and Faye Dunaway in the Lester films. De Mornay does occasionally get upstaged by her own cleavage a time or two, though it must be said. Yes, it must be said.

As for the other Musketeers…well, two of them are pretty good. Charlie Sheen gets by as religious-yet-amorous Aramis by playing it very much in 1993 Charlie Sheen fashion. It works. Kiefer Sutherland is a good choice for the fiery, embittered Athos. They both seemingly enjoy drinking. All tabloid rumour jokes aside, Sutherland (who rather dismissively claimed to have made this for his kids) is brooding without getting glum, ala Van Heflin in the otherwise very fine 1948 film. As for the ‘fourth’ musketeer, D’Artagnan…ugh. Remember when Hollywood tried to make Chris O’Donnell a thing for a few years there? Yeah, that thankfully only lasted about 5 years or so. Sure, it’s hard to compete with Gene Kelly (1948) and Michael York (1970s), but O’Donnell is not only miscast but mostly wooden-as-hell as the wannabe musketeer, a very important role in the film. He’s the lead, after all. He plays the role like he’s a California surfer dude. I know the other musketeers are played by Americans and a Canadian (Kiefer Sutherland), but O’Donnell stands out like a sore thumb. Did he land the role solely because of his impressive jaw? ‘Coz that’s all I got here. Sure, he handles the action OK and maybe the occasional bit of comedy, but whenever he needs to do or say anything beyond that? Yeah, not buying it. He’s bland and utterly forgettable. Ditto Gabrielle Anwar, but that’s largely because her role is bland and utterly forgettable, not because she’s particularly miscast in the part. O’Donnell isn’t the weakest link in the cast, though. That would be Irish actor Hugh O’Conor and his absurd Prince Valiant hairdo as King Louis. Both are pretty hard to take, to be honest. Better small turns come from an hilarious Paul McGann and his hilarious high-pitched scream as an enemy of D’Artagnan’s (he also appears again more briefly in a different henchman role), and the perfectly OK Julie Delpy as Constance, love interest for D’Artagnan. On more technical aspects, this is a very handsome production with a terrific score by Michael Kamen (you guessed it, “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves”), and some nice action, swordplay, and stunt work throughout as well.

Director Herek’s best film to date, this swashbuckler isn’t quite as entertaining in 2019 as I found it at age 13 in 1993. However, it still holds up because a) Most of the cast work well, and b) It takes a classic story and tells it very solidly. It’s well-made studio movie entertainment for (essentially) all ages. Critics were a bit mean at the time to dismiss this as “Young Swords”, partly because a comparison to “Young Guns” doesn’t work as an insult, but also because it’s “The Three Musketeers”, its own thing. Anyone who dismissed this back in 1993 owes it to themselves to give it another look. If you still don’t find it a fun watch, it might just be on you.

Rating: B