The Three Musketeers - D'Artagnan

Not Giving Athos

The Three Musketeers -
d'Artagnan
Directed by Martin Bourboulon
France/Germany/Spain/Belgium  
2023 Pathe
UK cinema release print

Warning: Spoilers to this and, presumably, the sequel, abound.

I’ve always loved adaptations of The Three Musketeers, since I was a kid when my parents took me to cinemas to see Richard Lester’s versions - The Three Musketeers and The Four Musketeers - and also watching the cartoon version which used to play as part of The Banana Splits show. And I can say I have actually read the first of the three books (five in the UK... get to that in a minute) which make up Alexandre Dumas’ d'Artagnan romances (romance being used in its original, proper usage rather than the lovey dovey stuff that its come to be associated with over the centuries by slovenly practitioners of the King’s English). These are The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After and The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later.

It’s been quite a while since I read that first book and, alas, because the novels come from one big serial, depending on which publisher you read them with, they are split at different points. It got complicated and, since the publisher I read only had the first title in the set, I have no way of knowing if I would be missing a few chapters out if I read the next one from a different publisher. Moreover, some of the English translations were apparently ‘woked up’ (aka stupidly censored) when it came to various sexual references in the course of the adventures... so there’s no way I’d want to read one of those abominations. Also, the third book is split into between three and five novels over here (again, depending on which translation and publisher you read)... with the most famous being the last part, The Man In The Iron Mask, which has also been made into countless films.

Now I don’t often go to modern movie adaptations but I went to this one, The Three Musketeers - d'Artagnan, because it’s the first time the French have produced their own adaptation of the novel in around 60 years and, also, because Eve Green plays Milady in both this and the sequel (which is set to come out in December of this year... at least in France, we may get it a month or two later in the UK, I’m guessing). So, yeah, I went and, bottom line (if you are concerned with such things) is that I thoroughly enjoyed it. Although one of its problems is one that has plagued pretty much every big or small screen adaptation I’ve seen of it over the years...

Which is... they’ve taken a lot of liberties with this adaptation and this always seems to be the case. So, honestly, if you’re expecting to see a close version to the source literature with this new incarnation, think again... it’s way off at many points (although it certainly nails the spirit of the source). There are three things particularly that stick out and that riled me a little as I watched...

One is that none of the characters appear to have any servants... so characters like Planchet are not present (indeed, a part of his role seems to have been given to Athos after a plot development which seems to differ quite dramatically if memory serves... and it possibly doesn’t serve so well these days so, please be kind to me in the comments, if any).

Secondly, the love of d’Artangan’s life, Constance, is not married to another man as she is in the books and, nor does he have ‘liaisons’ with Milady at some point. So, yeah, it’s a bit much like it’s trying to make everyone in this version extremely ‘pure in heart’, so to speak.

Thirdly, Porthos is pictured as being bisexual which, frankly, he wasn’t in the books and I’m hard pressed to believe that a soldier in the King’s Musketeers at the time would be so openly up front in sleeping with both sexes so... again, a barrier to the authenticity of the time they are trying to capture, for sure.

Other than stuff like this, though, I really didn’t mind all the plot embellishments active in the story and found all the swashbuckling action to be pretty fun. Especially with the approach they’ve take here with the choreographed fight sequences, which seems to be wandering camera taking you right into the action and following various people around without cutting. So yeah, technically it’s a very impressive film too and François Civil is a likeable d’Artagnan... so, there’s that.

One thing which I feel ashamed of myself for is this, though (and a similar thing happened to me on my viewing of the TV show The Rig, reviewed here) and the problem is... I’ve never really liked or appreciated Vincent Cassel. Thinking back on it now, though, that’s because he pretty much always plays a villain of some kind whenever I’ve seen him. Now I’ve watched him playing an arguably sympathetic character in Athos, I realise just how good an actor he is so, yeah, I need to start watching more stuff that he’s in, I think.

There is one other problem with the film, though and... I think it stems not from Cassel’s portrayal of Athos himself, who frankly does kind of turn into a bit of a villain by the later books (from a certain point of view) but, more from the script itself telegraphing things too obviously. And by that I mean... it’s been a long time since I read the book or saw a movie adaptation of it but, even though they seem to be saving this reveal as some kind of plot twist for the sequel... it was pretty obvious to me, as I’m sure it will be to half the audience watching, that the woman Athos was married to and turned in to be branded and hung was, in fact, Milady. Why they’ve chosen not to reveal this when it’s practically spelled out for the audience in terms of the implication of including certain flashbacks, seems a bit strange to me. I’d forgotten all about it but I was certainly in no doubt by the end of the picture (and staying around for the mid-credits post-credit scene helps telegraph this even more).

But, I don’t care... I really enjoyed The Three Musketeers - d'Artagnan and will be first in line for the sequel when it finally arrives on these shores. As I will be for the Blu Rays although, I suspect, the deviations from the original novel will be too much for my dad to remain in any way calm about. Still, if you’re going to see this one, make sure you see it at the cinema because it looks fantastic and the sound design, with the constantly jarring musket shots thumping onto the audio range during the battles, is also outstanding. A cracking good time at the cinema, for sure.