Movie Number 19 of 2024
The Movie: The Three Musketeers: Milady
The Cinema: Palace Cinemas. Balwyn
Stars: 3.5
This is the second part of the new French take on The Three Musketeers. I saw the first part, D'Artagnan a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it, so it felt it a good thing to see the second part, particularly as this film would have a bit more focus on the mysterious Milady (Eva Green). Even more so after Milady's departure in the first film.
As much as I loved the first film, this second part of the franchise left me somewhat cold. I found this film far more disjointed than the first, which made watching it a little bit of a chore.
The film continues on from the first film, where D'Artangnan (Francois Civil) has gone to meet his lady love, Constance (Lyna Khoudri) only to see her being dragged off by thugs. He is then unceremoniously bonked on the head and is being taken off to the baddies to receive whatever is coming to him. Which is more sword fights. There are lots of sword fights. Of course there are. It's a movie about the Three Musketeers.
At this point, France is gunning for war. The other three musketeers are preparing for battle. Athos (Vincent Cassel) is preparing his son for the fact that he might not come home. Aramis (Romain Duris) and Bathos (Pio Marmai) are doing a lot of drinking, while Aramis is looking to sort out the person who knocked up his sister who is currently working in a nunnery.
Oh, and we work out pretty quickly that Milady is back, which is a bit strange because at the end of the last movie she did a swan dive off the White Cliffs at Dover... and now she's back. Who knew? Can't kill her. WITCH!
This was a hard film to follow. There's a lot going on. It's hard to ascertain just who are the good guys. Of course, you know that Cardinal Richelieu (Eric Ruf) is an absolute prick. You're not sure if the Duke of Buckingham (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd) is working for the good to the ill of the Protestants.
And of course, there is Milady. Yes, you learn her back story, but her fingers are in so many pies. And then there's her relationship to Athos - like what went on there.
All of this makes the film very hard to follow at times.
What I did like about this, aside from the difficulty following the plot, was the scenery and fight sequences. 17th Century France has never looked so lovely. That some of the scenes were filmed at St Malo made it even more special for me, as I was there last year. The setting and costumes are phenomenal, and in many ways realistic. Nobody looks like they've had a bath or a decent haircut in years.
Martin Bourboulon's direction is as punchy as ever. In some ways the humour that comes out with the side story of Aramis and his sister brings a lighter energy to what could have been a heavy film. And of course, the action is top notch.
However, the script is really hard to follow, and this did detract from the general enjoyment of the film.
As a sequel to the first Three Musketeers film, it's great, but I don't think I would like to see this one without seeing the other one first. There are too many things to keep track of without knowing the history of what has happened before.
No comments:
Post a Comment