Today is "The Three Musketeers (1948)" "The Three Musketeers (1973)" "The Three Musketeers (1993)" and "The Musketeer (2001)"
(1948) Version
Starring Gene Kelly, Angela Lansbury, Lana Turner and Vincent Price
D'Artagnan (Kelly) starts out having a rather hectic adventure, finding action, love, hate, plotting and an indestructible friendship with Athos, Porthos and Aramis. Queen Anne (Lansbury) is looking regal, the Musketeers are looking swashbuckling and Richelieu (Price) is impressively chilling, utterly foreboding and totally not in a good mood. The fight scenes are impressively eye-catching, utterly breathtaking and totally had to be done by either stunt doubles or very gifted, waiver-signing actors.
(1973) Version
Starring Oliver Reed, Raquel Welch, Richard Chamberlain and Michael York
D'Artagnan (York) fights his way through minor disturbances, major upheavals and is still glad he went to Paris. Oh and how inspiring and awestruck the audience will be at the most incredible fight scenes in this film. So inspiring in fact, that one may get carried away and fling popcorn up into the air and catch each kernel on the end of a Twizler stick. The two baddies Richelieu (Charlton Heston) and Rochefort (Christopher Lee) are inspiring as well when they tend to get everyone into a fighting mood to begin with. Mistress DeWinter (Faye Dunaway) is smooth and smart and as always, deadly and beautiful, which helps when dealing with 17th century spies and scribes.
(1993) Version
Starring Charlie Sheen, Kiefer Sutherland, Oliver Platt, Chris O'Donnell and Tim Curry
The most moving performance in this film is that of Lady Sabine DeWinter (Rebecca De Mornay) and is the most memorable of all the franchise. Between the dark, unpleasant accounts of France's history and the lighthearted jokesters Aramis, Athos and Porthos, it was the one element in the film that went into more detail than any of the others in the pantheon of musketeer legend. They fight, they ride, they drink, they dance and wouldn't you know it, they save the king and queen of France. Hey that rhymes! Richelieu (Curry) is absurdly full of lust, desire for power and wears billowing red silk attire everyday - albeit he does have armor to put with it. Rochefort (Michael Wincott) is absurdly full of vengeance, wears a black ensemble that looks shabby yet chic and matches with his eye-patch. Somehow this is the pirate version of the three musketeers nut in a nutshell. D'Artagnan rides a horse in one scene and falls asleep atop his steed in another, then falls off the horse and appears to be beyond exhaustion. If only we knew where he was going exactly, since there were shorter routes in France even back then.
The Musketeer (2001)
Starring Catherine Deneuve, Justin Chambers, Mena Suvari and Stephen Rea
A young D'Artagnan has a rather traumatic experience as a child, grows up scarred from it and maintains a very impressive skill as a swordsman. Even without therapy. He fights upon barrel after barrel, amid and atop a collection of ladders and is lucky enough to not fall to his death thanks to a tower full of ropes. D'Artagnan rides a horse in one scene. Then in another and another and another. This time the horse drops in exhaustion.
As for director Peter Hyams, the lighting in this movie is a laugh riot. The mood of shadow and darkness may have worked for his thrillers Outland & 2010 but this was the wrong movie to have this moody effect. We're supposed to be able to see who D'Artagnan kills!
This has been my Multiple Movie Review. Have a super-sized popcorn combo, you're gonna need it.
(Note: The novel by Alexandre Dumas has been the inspiration for these films, for the most part)
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