Certificate: 15 (brief strong injury detail, violence)
Running Time: 121 mins
UK Distributor: Entertainment Film
WHO’S IN THE THREE MUSKETEERS: D’ARTAGNAN?
François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Pio Marmaï, Romain Duris, Eva Green, Lyna Khoudri, Louis Garrel, Vicky Krieps, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Alexis Michalik, Patrick Mille, Ivan Franek, Ralph Amoussou, Eric Ruf
WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?
Martin Bourboulon (director), Matthieu Delaporte and Alexandre de La Patellière (writers), Dimitri Rassam (producer), Guillaume Roussel (composer), Nicolas Bolduc (cinematographer), Célia Lafitedupont (editor)
WHAT’S IT ABOUT?
In 17th century France, young D’Artagnan (Civil) allies himself with three noble musketeers…
WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON THE THREE MUSKETEERS: D’ARTAGNAN?
There have been many adaptations of French author Alexandre Dumas’ classic adventure novel The Three Musketeers over the decades, spanning across film, television, stage, radio, graphic novels, and even video games – but oddly enough, very few adaptations have ever been in its original language.
You’d have to go all the way back to 1961 to find the last French film adaptation of The Three Musketeers, which funnily enough was also a two-part project, as is director Martin Bourboulon’s ambitious, and very French, new take on the material.
The first part of Bourboulon’s adaptation, with the second being shot simultaneously and is currently due for release later in the year, covers roughly the first half of Dumas’ novel, which begins in seventeenth-century France as the Catholic country faces war with both the English and the growing Protestant uprising, although the court of King Louis XIII (Louis Garrel) is already a battlefield in and of itself, with the scheming Cardinal de Richelieu (Eric Ruf) secretly plotting to take power for himself.
Meanwhile, strapping young lad D’Artagnan (François Civil) rides into Paris with the hopes of joining the King’s army of musketeers, and quickly forms an unexpected alliance with the familiar band of three, including Athos (Vincent Cassel), Porthos (Pio Marmaï) and Aramis (Romain Duris). When Athos is framed for a gruesome murder, D’Artagnan and his new friends set out to prove his innocence, uncovering in the process a full-scale conspiracy set into motion by the Cardinal, involving a secret love affair between the Queen of France (Vicky Krieps) and the English Duke of Buckingham (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd), and the nefarious and mysterious Milady (Eva Green) who works for the Cardinal.
As much as I am already somewhat familiar with the basic outline of The Three Musketeers, mainly due to its unmistakable place in popular culture, I still have never read the actual book, so I don’t really know if this new version – or more accurately, the first half of this new two-part version – is more faithful to the source material than a lot of other adaptations have been. However, even as someone who never read the book, I found The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan (as this first part is officially titled) to be a rather entertaining ride, with some impressive production values and refreshingly grounded fight sequences that emphasise the grittier tone that director Bourboulon wants to achieve, while still keeping it from getting too grim for its own good.
It is a very well-made movie, with the sets, costumes, cinematography et al on fine form, all of which benefits from the healthy €36 million budget (out of the overall €72 million that covers both this and the next part, subtitled Milady) that it has been granted. The budget particularly comes in handy during a number of tightly-shot action sequences where handheld cameras capture everything in seemingly one continuous take, but you can still tell who and where everyone is even as the camera continuously rocks back and forth because they have the resources to actually make such scenes watchable, unlike the last French-directed action movie I saw which was Assassin Club, which might as well have been filmed on a Gravitron going at supersonic speed.
The action is well-done, and there is a sense of engagement because you do like these characters and their individual personalities, to where you care if one or more of them is close to being in mortal danger. It helps that they’ve got a bucketload of charismatic actors to bring a decent amount of life into them, such as François Civil who certainly plays into D’Artagnan’s arrogance but never so much so that you’re actively rooting against him, and Eva Green who doesn’t have many scenes in this film (and is clearly saving her biggest moments for the next one; it is called Milady, after all) but is clearly having a lot of fun as she often seems to do in other villainous roles.
As for the three musketeers themselves, they are oddly the least developed out of the entire ensemble, with Vincent Cassel’s Athos side-lined for most of it, while Pio Marmaï and Romain Duris as Porthos and Aramis respectively not being given much to do with few defining traits to speak of, other than one being somewhat smarmy and the other happening to be bisexual. The actors do well here, but like with Green, perhaps they’ll be given a whole lot more stuff to work with in the next one, because right now it’s glaring how the three musketeers can feel so arbitrary in a movie where they are literally part of the title.
The script, by Matthieu Delaporte and Alexandre de La Patellière, styles itself as a political conspiracy thriller in historical France, with D’Artagnan and his allies uncovering pieces of the plot that the corrupt high-ranking Cardinal has kicked into action. Again, I don’t know if the original book follows this plotline as tightly as it does in this film, but the way in which the writers have structured it, with Bourboulon’s steady direction, makes it engaging enough to where you’re interested in how it will turn out, even if you already know full well what ends up happening.
It’s not exactly subtle about some of its complex themes of religion and honour – and from what I do hear about the book, Dumas gets into some heavy detail about those topics which doesn’t seem to have been wholly replicated here – but where it counts, there’s some good quality entertainment to come out of watching some of these nail-biting action sequences where there are some genuine stakes every now and then.
Since The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan is intended as the first of two parts, you shouldn’t expect this to be a wholly satisfying standalone movie. A lot of loose threads are left dangling, and it even ends on a cliffhanger at a pivotal moment in a character’s journey, the intention of course being that they’ll all be resolved in some way during the next one, but I have the feeling that few will go into this knowing that it’s even a two-parter, kind of like how some audiences expressed disappointment after finding that Dune was only doing half the Frank Herbert book.
Like that movie, though, the second one is just around the corner, and if it continues the steady and enjoyable pace of this first entry, then this new French adaptation of The Three Musketeers really will be all for one, and one for all.
SO, TO SUM UP…
The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan is an entertaining first film in an ambitious two-part adaptation of the classic Alexandre Dumas novel, boasting some impressive production values and a charismatic acting ensemble, but fans of the book may miss the complexity with some of the story’s themes, and limited roles for the three musketeers themselves.
The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan is showing in cinemas from Friday 21st April 2023
