Jamie
D’Artagnan is back, Jack! And boy is he ready to karate chop you in the neck. Coming to Paris to become a Musketeer, our boy Lil D is shocked to find them in disarray. But that doesn’t stop him from doing one for all and all for one. Can he stop the eeeeevil Cardinal Richelieu and his henchman before it’s too late? Find out in… The Musketeer.
How?! D’Artagnan is just a young boy when he witnesses his parents’ deaths at the hands of Cardinal Richelieu’s henchman Febre. Trained by his father’s loyal friend Planchet (yeeeaaaaah boy) Lil D grows up to be a backflipin’, rope swingin’, ladder climbin’, barrel rolling swordsman extraordinaire. Arriving in Paris ready to become a Musketeer he finds the group disbanded and Aramis, Porthos and Athos bitter men ready to give it all up. But Lil D says nay! Not in the face of a nefarious scheme by Cardinal Richelieu to kickstart a war between France and England. And not in the face of a beautiful young woman, Francesca, who he wants to woo with his daring deeds. He convinces them to help free the imprisoned head of the Musketeers and take him to safety. Then, catching wind of a scheme to attack the King of France and the English dignitary Buckingham to show the weakness of the throne, he recruits them to help kung fu the King and Queen to safety. Hoping to keep peace, d’Artagnan is recruited to organize a meeting between the Queen and Buckingham only to be betrayed and the Queen, Francesca and Buckingham are kidnapped. In a stirring climax, LilD4Life jumps all over some ropes and ladders and owns Febre like he’s never been owned and saves the day. Cardinal Richelieu is actually relieves, as the scheme had gotten quite out of hand, but our man Lil D ain’t having it and basically implies he better watch his back. Then he and Francesca smooch a whoooooole bunch. THE END
Why?! Uh, for all and for one? Duh. Specifically, all for one and one for all. Truly for the honor of the throne and for the honor of d’Artagnan’s legacy and his daddio and even the King of France who kinda sucks. The bad guys just want power… but they can’t handle it… they can’t handle the power because it’s a corrupting force and only someone pure of heart and mind and with abs for days like d’Artagnan can resist it.
Who?! I always do like noting when nonfictional or fictional Kings and other important historical figures are shown in film. This obviously has a huge number. It’s also funny to think how a figure like Louis XIII, who would likely have rarely been seen in films, would end up being portrayed over and over again due to The Three Musketeers. And probably in many of them, this included, the role is fairly minor. Here he was portrayed by Daniel Mesguich… you know. That guy.
What?! I mean, obviously this adaptation takes the bold step of changing the main Musketeer slogan to One for All and All for a Refreshing Coca-Cola to which they all cheers some classic Coke’s and play beach volleyball. But I mean, that’s hardly a product placement. That’s just life. And honestly we’re about 15 years too late to pick up props online for this guy. So just take solace in the fact that the full Cardinal getup from the 2011 classic is going for $10,000.
Where?! France for days. In fact I’d be hard pressed to find another film that was more French than this film. From Paris with Love starring John Travolta, sure, but that barely qualifies. Oh wait, I got it. The Three Musketeers starring Planchet… God, what a great adaptation. No wonder we’re going back to Paul W. S. Anderson next week. A.When?! The beginning is similar to the classic Three Musketeers storyline in that d’Artagnan is going to Paris to join the Musketeers at the time that Caridinal Richelieu is trying to stoke war between France and England. This would place this film in 1625. Although they don’t make this clear in the film I don’t think. They just say the events take place 14 years after d’Artagnan’s parents were killed which is unhelpful. D.
When?! The beginning is similar to the classic Three Musketeers storyline in that d’Artagnan is going to Paris to join the Musketeers at the time that Caridinal Richelieu is trying to stoke war between France and England. This would place this film in 1625. Although they don’t make this clear in the film I don’t think. They just say the events take place 14 years after d’Artagnan’s parents were killed which is unhelpful. D.
This movie is shockingly boring for a film that is based entirely on the premise “Three Musketeers but with some martial arts.” It’s actually pretty well made and all that, but everything is real dark and they seemed to have trouble editing it together in the end so it feels pretty choppy. Also Justin Chambers was just not ready to carry a film and he is unfortunately quite bad. Not great for someone who is in approximately 100% of the film, especially when I think Roth and Rae are both pretty good. Overall, I just wish it was a little more over the top. As it is, it’s merely a subpar adaptation of The Three Musketeers with some fun fight scenes and some bad filmmaking and acting. Also, they needed more Planchet. Disappointing really. Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! The legendary literary badass d’Artagnan has had maybe like … 400 films made about him. But this ain’t your dad’s d’Artagnan. This time he’s attached to wires and doing kung fu. Let’s go!
P’s View on the Preview – I was very excited for this film. The trailer is one of the craziest things you’ll ever watch. It seems like a normal Three Musketeers film … but then the wire-fu parkour magic starts. It is almost immediately obvious that it was a bad idea, but we could never really figure out a way to fit it into BMT … until now! What were my expectations? Just the craziest thing you’ll ever see. Anything less would be a disappointment. I want The Three Musketeers starring Jackie Chan basically, I want them to throw out everything that makes the Three Musketeers the Three Musketeers and just make them martial arts masters!
The Good – The film is shot beautifully … if you ignore the fact that it was clearly too dark. If you cut out the Hong Kong fight choreography this would actually be a pretty okay (if poorly acted) Three Musketeers film. Somehow the direction ends up being both the strength and weakness of the film. A strength in that the set design and general look are really interesting. A weakness because I think it ends up being structurally a mess, which by all accounts was the director’s fault. Best bit: Set design.
The Bad – Let’s start with the acting. I have nothing against Justin Chambers and the rest of the main actors in the film, but overall it does come across as a tv movie because of the people involved. The action scenes are too much and too little at the same time. They are too stylized and jarring if you only have a few of them, which I think is what happened here. If you are going to go that big and shocking, you should just go balls to the wall and have every scene be an action scene. Finally, the story is just boring and confusing. It may have worked better using a very simple story and focusing a lot more on the action element. Fatal flaw: Action scenes are too much, and occur too infrequently.
The BMT – Sadly I think this will go down as a near miss for BMT. A “oh, what could have been!”. In an alternative universe this film is wall to wall parkour with people dressed as musketeers! But alas, within the film there is hiding a dimly lit earnest telling of the story of d’Artagnan. Somehow, against all odds, the 2013 Three Musketeers film (complete with Planchet) is actually a much better BMT in my estimation. Did it meet my expectations? Oh you couldn’t tell from that? No. It certainly is a pretty bad movie, mostly due to the acting and falling short in the action set pieces. But it should have been oh, so much more.
Roast-radamus – Naturally this is a great Setting as a Character (Where?) and Period Piece (When?) for the clear 17th century Paris setting. Otherwise there isn’t much there, and it is closest to being a Bad film in the end.
StreetCreditReport.com – It is a bit surprising maybe, but the bad movie lists weren’t really happening in 2001. I don’t know why really, but whatever. This is probably the second worst Musketeer film though. I would call it the worst, but if you look anywhere all critics consider the 2011 film to be the worst (and I generally agree). Still, that combined with the bizarre genre mash-up is street cred enough.
You Just got Schooled – I was very much looking forward to this because I ended up figuring out that there have been multiple Three Musketeers cartoons throughout history. First, I watched the Hanna Barbera version which debuted as part of The Banana Splits Adventure Hour. Released in 1968, this seems like an odd time for Hanna Barbera, after their big hits in The Flintstones and The Jetsons ended in the mid-60s, but before Scooby-Doo which would premiere a year later in 1969. I ended up watching the first episode of Banana Splits (which had an Arabian Knights cartoon and weird live-action cliffhanger-based shorts called Danger Island) and the Three Musketeers part of the second episode. The Banana Splits are brutally unfunny characters meant to entertain 5-year-olds (maybe). Meanwhile both Arabian Knights and Danger Island are genuinely racist garbage. So against all odds the cheaply made and boring Three Musketeers ended up being the best bit from that. D-, very little to recommend from this Hanna Barbera catastrophe. Additionally, I watched the first episode of The Three Musketeers anime (Anime Sanjūshi) from 1987. Directed by the guy who would end up directing all of the pokemon anime, it shows. It very much reminds me of the pokemon show in that it is probably too boring to sustain a binge watch, but was entertaining enough that maybe I’ll end up watching another one eventually. B-. I kind of fell into a rabbit whole with animation recently. The history of animation I think is endlessly fascinating. So being able to watch two not-very-good old-school Musketeers animated shows was a delight, even if neither ended up being particularly good.
Cheerios,
The Sklogs
Bad Movie Twins 