Posted By admin on January 25, 2010

Or, the return of 365 Movies!

Movie 10

The Three Musketeers (1973)
Rated PG
Runtime: 105 minutes
Written by my hero, George MacDonald Fraser, with an assist from Alexandre Dumas père
Directed by Richard Lester
Notable peoples: Michael York, Oliver Reed, Charlton Heston, Faye Dunaway, Raquel Welch, Christopher Lee, Richard Chamberlain, Frank Finlay
Look out for: Iconic British actor (and C.S. Lewis portrayer) Joss Ackland, as D’Artagnan’s daddy.

There are myriad versions of The Three Musketeers in filmland, but I’ve yet to see one more enjoyable. I’m not even sure where to start with this movie, is how much I love it. I guess I’ll start with the incredibly light and witty writing and directing. Richard Lester is probably best known for letting the Fab Four run about in front of his camera in both A Hard Day’s Night and Help!, and there’s a touch of that manic energy at work here as well, but it’s tempered with more sober cinematography and a stately (at times) score by Michel Legrand. As for the writing, well, I’ve been in love with George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman series of books since I was a teenager, so I’m not even going to pretend to be objective. Fraser imbues Dumas’ characters with a new sense of wit and fun, while still letting them be themselves in the best way possible.

And the cast is stellar. Michael York plays an unbelievably earnest D’Artagnan, Oliver Reed made me love him for life as Athos, Richard Chamberlain (my first big gay boyfriend) plays Aramis as a deadly dandy, and Frank Finlay plays Porthos as not-quite-the-buffoon. Throw in Christopher Lee as Rochefort, Faye Dunaway as Milady, Raquel Welch (perfectly cast as the hapless Constance), mix well with veteran character actors Roy Kinnear as Planchet, Spike Milligan as M. Bonacieux, and Jean-Pierre Cassel as Louis XIII, and you really have to try hard not to have a fabulous time watching this movie.

Here, the boys demonstrate how to eat out on a budget:

Movie 11

The Four Musketeers (1974)
Rated PG
Runtime: 108 minutes
Written by my hero, George MacDonald Fraser, with an assist from Alexandre Dumas père
Directed by Richard Lester
Notable peoples: Michael York, Oliver Reed, Charlton Heston, Faye Dunaway, Raquel Welch, Christopher Lee, Richard Chamberlain, Frank Finlay
Look out for: Z-movie queen Sybil Danning, as one of Milady’s maids.

Okay, so I’m kind of cheating here, but they were released as two movies, so I get to count them as two movies, even though they were filmed simultaneously and broken up when everyone realized how long this was all getting.

The second half of our story takes a more grim turn (especially for the female members of the cast) what with war breaking out and Athos revealing his little secret, and various folks dying and whatnot. But it’s an action-packed and very satisfying conclusion, and leavened with enough fun to still be fantastic.

And never let it be said the musketeers don’t know how to dine well:

Today’s quote – “Let me have a Three Musketeers, and a ball point pen, and one of those combs there, a pint of Old Harper, a couple of flash light batteries and some beef jerky.”

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