The Three Musketeers

After viewing this film I wound up scratching my head with so many questions of how this thing ever got made in the first place.

Firstly three years before there was a straight dramatic version of The Three Musketeers that starred Walter Abel as D'Artagnan by RKO. That film was well received although it didn't transform Abel into a leading man. Why Darryl Zanuck made another version so soon is beyond me.

Secondly Rudolph Friml wrote a fine operetta of The Three Musketeers in the 20s. The score here by Walter Bulloch and Samuel Pokrass is singularly unmemorable. Who knows why Friml's music wasn't used, but it should have been.

Zanuck had the ideal D'Artagnan on his lot in Tyrone Power. But since Power didn't sing and Don Ameche always got sloppy seconds in roles at Fox, he got the part. Poor Ameche, he tried his best and he even gets into the comic elements of the film, but it's no good.

At year 2004 very few people know of the Ritz Brothers. They were good burlesque comedians who Zanuck signed up. Their humor was of The Three Stooges variety, but each stooge had an individual personality. You can't tell one Ritz from the other. In the film they take the place of the real Athos, Porthos, and Aramis and they and Ameche bungle their way into one situation after another.

Of the women in the cast I have to say that Binnie Barnes as Milady DeWinter gets into the spirit of the slapstick with the Ritzes.

It's a mess this film, but more so when you think that a straight musical with the Friml score could have been done and now probably never will and a version with Ty Power as D'Artagnan would have been a classic.

The Ritz Brothers are an acquired taste...like arsenic! Try as I might, every film I have seen these guys in I have thoroughly despised them. Now I read at least one review that liked this comedy(?) team, but I cannot stand them. I have reviewed quite a few films over the years by teams like the Marx Brothers, Olsen and Johnson, Wheeler and Woolsey, Abbott and Costello as well as the Three Stooges (all contemporaries of the Ritz's) and can say that for me, they are by far the least talented team of the era. Most of this is because unlike these other teams, there is no distinct personality for any of the three Ritz brothers. They all look pretty much the same and mug almost constantly for the camera. They also do not appear to have any talents other than acting goofy--not exactly a deep act! If you asked me which one was Harry or Jimmy, I certainly couldn't tell you--and I assume it's probably true for most people who have seen their films. So why, oh why, did they think to put these no-talents into Dumas' classic tale?! It's even more perplexing because the rest of the film is played so straight and the Ritz moments seem almost tacked on or an intrusion. I can only assume that studio chief Darryl Zanuck must have been insane at the time or under the influence!

Other than the Ritz's antics, the rest of the film an an odd melange. On one hand, the ever-competent Don Ameche stars as D'Artagnan was not a bad casting decision--he was handsome and could sing quite nicely. The film also looked very nice. However, someone must have really had it out for Ameche, as in addition to saddling him the with Ritz Brothers, many of the songs they gave him to sing (in particular the first one) were simply awful. The tunes weren't bad but the lyrics...uggh!!! My house needed fumigation after several of them!

What we have left are some decent actors trying to make the best of an untenable situation. They tried their best but the film simply was begging to be remade. My advice is to see the 1948 version with Gene Kelly or any of the more recent remakes, as they are head and shoulders above this 1939 mess--one of the few stinkers to come from this golden year in Hollywood.

Overall, a tedious mess. The only good in the film I can think of is that it led to a clever episode of "Leave it to Beaver". The Beaver was supposed to do a book report on "The Three Musketeers" and instead watched this film and based the report entirely on it! Not surprisingly, he got an F and learned his lesson! I do wonder what this movie would have been like with the Marx Brothers and their zaniness. Sure, at the time they were employed by a different studio (MGM), but they could have really given the film a needed infusion of anarchy and goofiness.

Not worth your time unless you are a 100% crazed movie freak (like me). Try ANY other version of the tale--it can't help but be better.

(1939) The Three Musketeers MUSICAL COMEDY ADVENTURE

Somewhat of a faithful adaption of Alexadre Dumas famous "Three Musketeers" except that in the film the real three musketeers are replaced by the comedy duo team of "The Ritz Brothers". Upon the real musketeers becoming drunk and being carried to their beds, the Ritz Brothers wore their costumes to pose as them so that they can try to get some of the perks at the expense of becoming a musketeer, and it was during that time they meet the fourth musketeer D' Artagnan played by Don Ameche who coincide with them to retrieve a very expensive broche. The story has somehow been adapted to "The Ritz Brothers" comedy routines, which some of the comedy scenes may have worked during the time of it's release in 1939 but very tame in today's standards. The comedy routines are identical to what one can find in "The Marx Brothers" or "The Three Stooges" except that they're well known as opposed to "The Ritz Brothers". The musical numbers was originally annoying but after "one" of the songs has been re-sung 3 times throughout the film, the impact of the song wasn't effective until the final end, and it was during that time when the song became catchy. Because it was supposed to be a comedy, I'm going to give it a respectable thumbs down.

The renowned late British film historian Leslie Halliwell includes this film in his book " Halliwells hundred" as one of the funniest and under-appreciated musical spoofs in his long film going experience...this prompted me to take a look at it , and indeed it IS funny and it makes one wonder why the Ritz brothers are now all but forgotten by the general public(well, that shouldn't surprise anyone, as the "general" public has the memory of a fruit-fly when it comes to classic cinema...) and their contemporaries the 3 stooges are still so over-appreciated and all over the place....cults are strange things and often owe more to snobbish "in-the-know"-isms than real talent.... Nevertheless....the other review of this movie on this site seems to be a little besides the point....this is a bit of fluff, but it's Great fluff, made with style and often more straightforward and to the point than other more pompous versions of this old yarn...relax and enjoy it : its entertainment...as light and pleasant as a summers breeze, as funny as your self-important uncle falling face down in a cream pie! And oh yes, I DO know Friml's score for " the 3 musketeers"...it COULD have been used yes, but boy would it have been BORING!

Often underrated by film buffs. Don Ameche has never been more charming or vibrant than in this parody of the Dumas classic. He is handsome, he can sing, and he is a great comic actor. The casting of the Ritz Brothers, however, is an obvious attempt to raise their comedic profile. It doesn't work, and their charm remains, as many reviewers have noted, an acquired taste. The script panders to the nonsensical impulses of the times. It is interesting to note that this film was released in 1939, the same banner year as "Gone with the Wind" and numerous other successful Hollywood productions.