The Three Musketeers

In the last of three serials that John Wayne did making his bones in B picture Hollywood, he does what is described as a modern adaption of Alexander Dumas's classic The Three Musketeers. Any resemblance to that novel and this film is completely coincidental.

Wayne is an American pilot who is flying in North Africa and saves Jack Mulhall, Francis X. Bushman, Jr. and Raymond Hatton, Foreign Legionaires, from certain death by machine gunning from the air an attacking Berber tribe. The group of them strike up a great friendship and the three decide to call themselves The Three Musketeers and adopt Wayne as their D'Artagnan.

The Duke with that little action apparently messed up a planned revolution against the colonial occupiers so the would be revolutionaries frame him for gun running and later murder. It takes twelve chapters for Wayne to clear himself and unmask the mysterious masked leader of the Devil's Circle conspiracy, El Shaitan.

In the mess of a film where not one of the white dudes speak with any kind of an accent including the multi-national Foreign Legionaires, you can see elements of The Desert Song, Gunga Din, and Beau Geste. But other than the title not a hint of The Three Musketeers.

Lon Chaney, Jr. and Noah Beery, Jr. both make brief appearances in The Three Musketeers and both get killed early on in the serial. I'm sure neither of them counted this serial as anything they talked up in reminiscing about their careers.

Only confirmed and solid fans of John Wayne should watch this film. I can safely say that Alexander Dumas's spirit becomes most restless when this film is shown.

And an updating of sorts of the Dumas novel, from Mascot Pictures and directors Colbert Clark and Armand Schaefer. The "musketeers" are soldiers in the French Foreign Legion: Clancy (Jack Mulhall), Renard (Raymond Hatton), and Schmidt (Francis X. Bushman Jr.). They are stationed in North Africa where they battle frequent Arab uprisings. During one such battle they are saved by American military pilot Tom Wayne (John Wayne). When Tom is later framed for murder by the insidious "El Shaitan", mysterious leader of the Devil's Circle, the three legionnaires promise to help Wayne is whatever way they can, leading to much high-flying mayhem, desert sands survival, and dangerous shoot-outs.

Despite the title, this is much more Wayne's show than the three legionnaires. Wayne is good at the action scenes, even if his character should be a complete wreck by the end, after multiple fist-fights, falls from great heights, and even being shot a few times. Both Chaney and Beery Juniors have early roles, and it was fun seeing them so young. The story gets repetitive (a drawback for many lesser serials), and I would have liked the three musketeers to have been featured more. The masked bad guy El Shaitan was physically performed by Yakima Canutt with a voice dub from Charles Middleton.

"The Three Musketeers" was the third and final serial made by John Wayne for producer Nat Levine's Mascot Pictures. Oddly enough for Wayne, who made mostly westerns during this period, none of the three serials are westerns. In fact, in all three, he plays a pilot.

The story takes place somewhere in an Arab country where three members of the French Foreign Legion are the only survivors of an attack by Arabs. The three, Clancy (Jack Mulhall), Renard (Raymond Hatton) ans Schmidt (Francis X. Bushman Jr.) are rescued from certain death by Tom Wayne (John Wayne), an American pilot. The three legionnaires dub themselves "The Three Musketeers" (you know: "One for all, and all for one") and Wayne their "D'Artagnan.

A mysterious masked figure known as El Shaitan plots a rebellion against the Legion. Wayne is framed for the murder of his friend Armand Corday (Creighton Chaney) and spends the rest of the story trying to prove his innocence while at the same time attempting to learn the identity of El Shaitan.

Wayne is aided by the Musketeers and Corday's sister Elaine (Ruth Hall). There are of course several suspected "El Shaitans" over the course of the 12 chapters. Among the suspects are Col. Duval (Gordon De Main), the company commander, El Kador (Hooper Atchely) and others. Of course we don't learn the identity of the villain until the last chapter.

As in most of the Mascot serials, there is plenty of action, perilous situations and lots of racing around. I found that this serial had far too many flashback sequences and predictable situations. In its favor, it had Yakima Canutt doing most of the stunts and (shudder) even taking a small speaking part. Look closely for Kermit Maynard and I'm sure I saw Wally Wales (aka Hal Taliaferro) as other legionaires. Noah Beery Jr. appears briefly as Wayne's pal Stubbs.

Creigton Chaney is of course better known as Lon Chaney Jr. a name he would adopt in 1935 and use for the rest of his 40 year career. For John Wayne, he would soon move on to his Lone Star western series and would not appear in another serial.

An American action adventure; A story set in North Africa about three French Foreign Legion soldiers rescued by an army lieutenant. They join forces to find and arrest a mysterious Arab terrorist as he tries to wipe out the Foreign Legion. This film is loosely based on Alexandre Dumas' famous 1844 novel and a truncated version of the story. Its theatrical release came from an original 12-installment serial stitched together in chapter form so there is some summarising of the story throughout but it is unhampered by harsh editing that enfeebled the 70mins version release known as Desert Command (1946). It is a long swashbuckler for its slight storyline and it is not helped by some occasional stilted acting. John Wayne as a d'Artagnan-type is at the forefront of the action and is impressive. The trio of legionnaries: an Irishman, German and Frenchman provide light relief in their good-natured camaraderie. The air of mystery is thin but it there is enough distraction in impressive stunts, chases and physical conflict to make it barely watchable in one sitting. It also has some alluring desert photography shot on location.

After John Wayne's character tells his three musketeer friends he can't go with them, he tells them he's promised "Ruth Corday" he'd come back to marry her. He should have said "Elaine" Corday, the correct name for the character. Wayne obviously mixed up the first name of the actress ("Ruth" Hall) with the first name of the character she plays. He does, however, get her name correct in the rest of the film. I only noticed this goof since I am big on details, names and such and just happened to catch the error. Wayne, otherwise can do no wrong. It is always worth seeing him in his early days of film. Action-packed hero whether in the desert, like in this picture, or on the Western trail, he's always the hero.