The Man in the Iron Mask, fresh off the massive success of Titanic, we got the next movie starring huge heart throb Leonardo DiCaprio along with some of Hollywood's strongest male leads. Including a couple of my favorite actors John Malkovich and Jeremy Irons, so this was a movie I was looking forward to seeing, not to mention I was 13 at the time of this release and was totally in love with Leonardo DiCaprio, oh yes, good times. So of course this movie was love at first site with me, but as I grew up and watched the movie without my crush influence, I still found it to be a good solid movie. Leonardo stays strong as his first duo role as King Louis and Philippe and proves he can stand up with the heavyweights of Hollywood. Jeremy and John together with Leonardo had great chemistry and made The Man in the Iron Mask a really good watchable movie.
France is under the reign of King Louis XIV, who is bankrupting the country with his unpopular wars. When starving peasants in Paris start to riot for food, he responds by ordering his chief adviser, to send them rotten food. Meanwhile, the King wallows in hedonistic luxury while seducing a parade of women. The legendary three musketeers have retired from their posts: Aramis is now a priest of the Jesuit Order; Porthos is running a Parisian brothel; Athos has a son named Raoul who is just back from the war and ready to marry the girl he loves, Christine. At a festival, the two lovers are greeted by an older D'Artagnan, just before Raoul can propose, the King's eyes fall on Christine. He arranges for Raoul to be returned to combat and killed in a suicidal charge. In the wake of Raoul's death, Aramis initiates a plot to overthrow the King with the help of his old comrades. Only Athos and Porthos agree to the plan; D'Artangan refuses to betray his oath of allegiance. The three musketeers sneak into an island prison and arrange the escape of a mysterious prisoner: a man in an iron mask. Philippe, the identical twin of King Louis. While he looks indistinguishable from his brother, Philippe is compassionate and gentle and the plan is to replace Louis with Philippe.
While I've expressed my love for John and Jeremy, the true talent comes out in Gabriel Byrne's performance as well as Leonardo DiCaprio. Gabriel as D'Artagnan was just beautiful, charming, dashing, and very charismatic. While the movie could have had a little better direction, in some ways this felt more like a made for TV film at times, just with the big names. I'd say that's the movie's main flaw, but they were not given a big budget to make it into a great movie. Also the fact that Leonardo as Philippe, they take the iron mask off his face and he's still pretty! Eh, still I'd highly recommend it, it's the actors that make this movie very delightful to watch, one for all and all for one this movie is just tons of fun! Hey, that almost rhymes, I made a funny! OK, there's my cheesy joke, I'm done, just watch the movie.
8/10.
France is under the reign of King Louis XIV, who is bankrupting the country with his unpopular wars. When starving peasants in Paris start to riot for food, he responds by ordering his chief adviser, to send them rotten food. Meanwhile, the King wallows in hedonistic luxury while seducing a parade of women. The legendary three musketeers have retired from their posts: Aramis is now a priest of the Jesuit Order; Porthos is running a Parisian brothel; Athos has a son named Raoul who is just back from the war and ready to marry the girl he loves, Christine. At a festival, the two lovers are greeted by an older D'Artagnan, just before Raoul can propose, the King's eyes fall on Christine. He arranges for Raoul to be returned to combat and killed in a suicidal charge. In the wake of Raoul's death, Aramis initiates a plot to overthrow the King with the help of his old comrades. Only Athos and Porthos agree to the plan; D'Artangan refuses to betray his oath of allegiance. The three musketeers sneak into an island prison and arrange the escape of a mysterious prisoner: a man in an iron mask. Philippe, the identical twin of King Louis. While he looks indistinguishable from his brother, Philippe is compassionate and gentle and the plan is to replace Louis with Philippe.
While I've expressed my love for John and Jeremy, the true talent comes out in Gabriel Byrne's performance as well as Leonardo DiCaprio. Gabriel as D'Artagnan was just beautiful, charming, dashing, and very charismatic. While the movie could have had a little better direction, in some ways this felt more like a made for TV film at times, just with the big names. I'd say that's the movie's main flaw, but they were not given a big budget to make it into a great movie. Also the fact that Leonardo as Philippe, they take the iron mask off his face and he's still pretty! Eh, still I'd highly recommend it, it's the actors that make this movie very delightful to watch, one for all and all for one this movie is just tons of fun! Hey, that almost rhymes, I made a funny! OK, there's my cheesy joke, I'm done, just watch the movie.
8/10.