The Return of the Musketeers (1989)

Director:

Richard Lester

Writers:

George MacDonald Fraser (screenplay)
Alexandre Dumas père (book)

Release Date:

25 August 1989 (UK)

Genre:

Adventure | Comedy

Tagline:

Swashbuckling action, comedy capers and rollicking adventures, bigger and better than ever. They're back... all for one and one for all!

Plot:

It's 1649: Mazarin hires the impoverished D'Artagnan to find the other musketeers: Cromwell has overthrown the English king...

Plot Keywords:

Musketeer | Foreign Language Adaptation | Third Part | 1640s | Beautiful Woman

Cast

Michael York	...	D'Artagnan
Oliver Reed	...	Athos
Frank Finlay	...	Porthos
C. Thomas Howell	...	Raoul
Kim Cattrall	...	Justine de Winter
Geraldine Chaplin	...	Queen Anne
Roy Kinnear	...	Planchet
Christopher Lee	...	Rochefort
Philippe Noiret	...	Cardinal Mazarin
Richard Chamberlain	...	Aramis
Eusebio Lázaro	...	Duke of Beaufort (as Eusebio Lazaro)
Alan Howard	...	Cromwell
David Birkin	...	Louis XIV
Bill Paterson	...	Charles I
Jean-Pierre Cassel	...	Cyrano de Bergerac (as Jean Pierre Cassel)

Also Known As:

El regreso de los mosqueteros (Spain)
Le retour des mousquetaires (France)

MPAA:

Rated R for sexuality/nudity.

Runtime:

102 min

Country:

UK | France | Spain

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Rankcolor)

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

Spain:T | UK:PG | USA:PG (original rating) | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain

Company:

Ciné 5

Trivia:

Richard Lester was ill for most of the preproduction.

Goofs:

Continuity: Whilst ballooning to the finale castle, the fire keeps changing from lit in long shots to unlit in close up.

Quotes:

Justine de Winter: King Charles' death is inevitable, and France must not interfere. General Cromwell insists.
Cardinal Mazarin: Roundhead diplomacy. Does he think he can cut off a crowned head, even an English one, and royal France will stand by doing nothing?
Justine de Winter: What will France do?
Cardinal Mazarin: Stand by... protesting.

Movie Connections:

Followed by La Femme Musketeer (2004) (TV)

Difficult novel to adapt

French politics always have been a mess. The backdrop of "La Fronde" as the French civil war was known, is difficult to explain. There were no good or bad guys. The country was thrown into confusion and disarray.

The challenge of adapting the second Dumas novel (as well as the third) is that there is no clear cut plot element to hang your hat on. Unlike the race to get the jewels back from the first novel, "Twenty Years Later" is rather episodic and dis-jointed. the musketeers are no longer musketeers and (in the novel) they are not even on the same side of the political fence.

The movie tries. There is an attempt at the levity of the previous two films. The screenwriters attempt to throw in a weird romance between Athos' son Raoul and Lady De Winter's daughter (an evil son in the book). The writers also keep many of the major set pieces from the book (the fire ship plot against the heroes, the execution of Charles I, the escape of the prince of Condé, etc.) but in the end the film has no spirit.

Everyone involved must have dearly wanted to recapture the magic of the first two films. Lester was working under pressure on a television schedule and budget.

In his autobiography Michael York describes how he looked forward to the first day of shooting. The whole thing turned sour when Roy Kinnear had a tragic (and York believes, an unnecessary) accident. Kinnear was asked to ride his horse across a bridge in a long shot and tried to oblige. He fell and was rushed to the hospital where he later passed away. York feels the producers treated Kinnear and his family shabbily.

Any joy the actors may have had going in to the project evaporated after that.