The 5th Musketeer

An adaptation of Alexander Dumas' "The Man in the Iron Mask". While not nearly as good as the Leonardo DiCaprio version, it is still good fun and has a superb cast. Must say I'm not used to seeing Sylvia Kristel in a film where her clothes stay on.

Reviewer suchenwi, I'm with you. I liked this film back when it first came out, and I still like it. And the most basic reason is that it is great fun. In fact, when you think about it, all the various filmed depictions of musketeers are just made for that very reason...just to have a little fun. The film has a good cast. I've always liked Beau Bridges, and thought him to be a more enjoyable actor than his brother; however, his performance here (as Louis XIV / Philippe of Gascony) in certain scenes seems just a tad hyper. Rex Harrison, as political plotter Colbert is very good, and I can actually hear him here (I once saw him in a play at the Kennedy Center, and though we sat 5th row middle, we couldn't hear his mumbling, as was pointed out by the review the next morning in the "Washington Post"). Sylvia Kristel (most famous for her roles as Emmanuelle) is quite attractive, but it difficult to say if she was a good actress as Princess Maria Theresa since all her dialog was dubbed by another actress! Ursula Andress was around...as the king's high class *...and her acting was as good as always...which isn't saying much. The 4 Musketeers are played by Cornel Wilde, Alan Hale, Jr., Jose Ferrer Lloyd Bridges, and they all did very nicely, and it was good seeing them in these roles. Ian McShane played the bad guy...and did well at it (he seems to have a talent for such roles). Olivia deHavilland is here briefly as the King's Mother; a small role, and her final before retiring. With some variations, this is "The Man In The Iron Mask". It's a good story and great fun. It was filmed in Austria, and is beautifully done. (Trivia -- the Musketeers made a cameo appearance on Perry Como's Christmas special that year, which was also being filmed in Austria). Is this the finest version of this general story? Probably not. But I enjoyed it. You probably will, too.

First of all: I appreciate all the opinions listed on this page, also those which say this movie stinks... ;-) For me, however, it is quite a special film, because at that time I was in Vienna, attending university/school of medicine. One day in autumn of 1976 a sheet of paper was stuck in the lift cabin of my students' condo, reading "Extras wanted! Be at Rosenhügel Studios by 6 am on October something, 1976. Salary 400 ATS per day, free lunch." Well, not bad, with a monthly ATS 4,000 check from my father to cover all my expenses - and no chance for the revenue office to take its share... Well,at the venerable Rosenhügel studio halls I got a black suit with breeches and a tippet, with red linings, a long-haired whig and a grey hat, and off we went to Laxenburg Castle by bus. It was cold and foggy, and, like soldiers, the main occupation of extras is - to wait. To keep us warm we got tea and coffee and a hot soup. First shot was: Beau Bridges arrives in a coach, gets out and greets Rex Harrison "Gentleman, I did not expect you so far from the Gascogne". We, as the by-standing crowd, have to cheer, wave hats - but silently, as the "real" actors were recorded live. The brightly polished coach, brought in from the Hapsburg mews at Schönbrunn castle, is treated by a mattening spray to disperse the sunlamps' reflections. The assistant director calls by megaphone ACTIONNN! We cheer, the four horse carriage rolls in, stops. Bridges steps out - and bungles his line. CUT! Coach and horses are pushed back (the horses are not really happy with this), at least 30 minutes later we hear ACTIONNN again. And again something goes wrong, maybe the lacquer af the coach shines too bright, maybe a horse muted, once BB messed up his text again... I think we did it 5 times. And in the finished movie, at about 22 minutes run time, the lines of the twin king still are different from what I remember - seems they overdubbed it anyway. The next day we, "the people", were told to cheer again, and surge forward, till we get a signal, which tells us to back off in terror. ACTIONNN! We cheer and surge. Suddenly a horrendous BANG hits our faces and ears, obviously released from a saluting cannon hidden under the scaffolding on which the assistant director was standing. We DID back off!! No acting necessary. This big bang comes about five minutes later than the coach scene. All in all this was an almost magical experience, all the scenery, the big Panaflex camera with the great Mr. Cardiff at the viewer, the wind machine with a DeHavilland Gipsy Major engine - and running at arm's length around all this stellar Hollywood personality, namely Ursula Andress and Sylvia Kristel (after all, I was 22 at this time). So, despite admitting that the finished movie is quite some disappointment compared to so many other cloak and dagger stuff, be it French or Hollywood, I can't help having a fond eye on it, as you will understand.

Since the copy I acquired of this film bears the year of copyright as 1977, I can only assume it was delayed by 2 years because it was preceded by the 1977 TV version of THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK – given that the title under review is merely another adaptation of this classic Alexandre Dumas tale! Made on a grand scale, with a large and international star-studded cast, the film apparently intended to ape the jokey style of Richard Lester's recent two-part (1973/1974) rendition of Dumas' "The Three Musketeers". However, director Annakin was too much of an old-style film-maker to make that work and, in any case, his handling is generally uninspired – merely content to let the script (reworking James Whale's superior 1939 version!), the actors and Jack Cardiff's gorgeous color photography tell the tale, as it were (aided, of course, by Riz Ortolani's suitably rousing score). Amusingly, top billing here goes to the ladies: heroine Sylvia Kristel (fresh off the erotic "Emmanuelle" series, she even gets away with some very mild nudity!) and villainess Ursula Andress (at the tail-end of her stardom really but surprisingly enthusiastic). Incidentally, one of the novelties here is that Andress' Mademoiselle La Valliere (I was not familiar with the character when I encountered her in J. Sheridan LeFanu's "The Room In The Dragon Volant", which I subsequently turned into a script!) gets much more screen-time than her equivalent in the 1939 'original'; indeed, the two women have a number of confrontations throughout – notably when Andress sets a falcon on Kristal. The male lead, however, was a gross miscalculation as Beau Bridges' style of acting is too modern to pass muster in a period romp and in this company (though he must have relished getting close to two beauties such as he is flanked by here)! A measure of the (cynical) times, however, is the fact that the assassination attempt on the King (for which, being aware of it, he has deliberately sent his unwitting twin) resolves itself not by a persuasively sympathetic speech as in the 1939 version but rather a full-bloodied yet highly improbable action sequence! The Four Musketeers, then, are played up as much older than in the earlier version (they still get involved in plenty of derring-do but only 2 expire at the end): Cornel Wilde is D'Artagnan, Jose' Ferrer Athos, Lloyd Bridges (yes, Beau's dad!) Aramis and Alan Hale Jr. in his own real-life father's old role as Porthos – interestingly, 27 years prior to this, Wilde and Hale had appeared together in a similar swashbuckler, actually playing the sons of their respective characters here, AT SWORD'S POINT (1952)! Likewise, an over-age Rex Harrison 'replaces' Walter Kingsford as the Musketeers' court insider – though the muddled script fails to properly explain the reason behind the beating he receives towards the end! Ian McShane, on the other hand, is perhaps too young for the villainous Fouquet and, again, he emanates from a school of acting which jars with the rest of his colleagues (though he is certainly fun to watch). Olivia De Havilland (in her final theatrical appearance), then, is something of an embarrassment – popping up in a couple of scenes (confronting one Bridges and acknowledging another) as the former Queen-turned-Nun and Bernard Bresslaw (who seems to have strayed in from the "Carry On" series) is a blind inn-keeper! The prologue depicting the children's birth and enforced separation has been dropped here – presumably to instill an air of mystery into the proceedings; oddly, too, the all-important mask is given an impossibly clunky design (looking very much like a cooking-pot!). Finally, I have just realized that the version of the film I acquired and watched was 13 minutes short of the full-length running-time!

Most of the 9 comments I see here are negative to Luke-warm at best. So I beg to disagree and tell why I liked this film. Firstly, I haven't seen other renderings of the story, except for the Australian Burbank animation (1985), which I also cherished (for different reasons, of course). In fact, that anime made me read up on Wikipedia about the complex back stories, fiction and true, and after that I re-watched this Beau Bridges piece. I found him convincing both as Philippe and Louis XIV, and was thrilled by their duel on the shaky bridge (both dressed similarly, I was briefly on the edge of my seat). Then there's the ladies, who in my European cut expose interesting body parts, and when dressed still deliver strong emotions. But the roles that grabbed me most were Colbert and Fouqué, with their wheelings and dealings, mostly wrapped in courtly etiquette - quite fascinating. In contrast, the name-brand musketeers did not catch my attention so much. Finally, what detracted me most was the mismatch of the French dub and subtitles (DVD labeled Bakker 7812/773). In Vienna, Austria, the film was produced in English, but I wanted the "native" language - though very often I was astonished how many phrases can be translated differently to French, starting from "Je vous en prie" (dub) vs. "s'il vous plait" (subtitle). So I didn't get the convenient read-along experience I had hoped for. But all in all, I really enjoyed this film. And Sylvia Kristel impressed me quite much as Spanish royalty.

It's strange that THE FIFTH MUSKETEER leaves me with the impression that it's hardly worth watching despite a stellar cast and some gorgeous Austrian scenery. BEAU BRIDGES (in a dual role as a commoner and Louis XIV) does a competent but bland job in the film's major role, while assorted guest stars fill the supporting cast with some name value. One of the guest stars is OLIVIA DE HAVILLAND who might just as well have phoned in her role. She has about three minutes of screen time, at the most. None of the main roles are really fleshed out and the plot is a muddled mess. JOSE FERRER, CORNEL WILDE, ALAN HALE, JR. and LLOYD BRIDGES are competent enough as the four musketeers while REX HARRISON and HELMUT DANTINE merely add some name recognition to the cast, as does de Havilland in her tiny role as Queen Anne (about whom little is explained). It's a retread of familiar material done much better in the past, territory that would be revisited in the future with even more dash and vigor. A sleep inducing film that probably only gets male attention because URSULA ANDRESS and SYLVIA KRISTEL provide some feminine pulchritude in provocative period costumes. The most unforgivable aspect are the fight scenes of the swashbuckling kind but badly choreographed duels, unlike the sort of thing done so splendidly in the Flynn epics. The blades flash without much flourish. Summing up: Totally uninspired piece of work notable only for some lavish costumes and good location photography in Austria.

A rather sad film with several stellar actors near the end of their careers, playing men of action near the end of their own careers. The great cinematographer, Jack Cardiff, adds a touch of class to this otherwise ordinary film with some moody, misty shots of fields at dawn, gardens at sunset and fireworks. I find it almost unbearable to watch Cornel Wilde, Rex Harrison and Jose Ferrer in this film. It should have been called: Die Gotterdammerung-The Twilight of The Gods-(French-version). Lots of sword-play and some near-charming dialogue. Not as sharp or as witty as it could have been if it had been made 10 years earlier.

This retelling of Dumas' The Man in the Iron Mask makes for an ok film for a rainy day, but is hardly an epic swasbuckler. Beau Bridges is good in the dual roles of Louis and Phillipe, as is Rex Harrison as Colbert. Ian McShayne is delightfully evil as Fouquet and Ursulla Andress is wonderfully bitchy. Cornell Wilde and Alan Hale Jr. reprise their roles (sort of) from the film At Swords Point. Papa Bridges is around as a decidedly unreligious Aramis, and Jose Ferrer trades Cyrano's nose, for Athos' tunic. Sylvia Kristel is rather wooden as Marie Therese. In all, there is little for the actors to work with, but the scenery is nice and a few action sequences are quite good. Still one could have hoped for better things with this cast.

It's not a bad movie, but the best parts are played by the women. Ursula Andress looks absolutely incredible (like that comes as a surprise) and is very convincing as the bitchy yet extremely alluring Louise de la Vallière, mistress to King Louis. Sylvia Kristal is also very good in her role as well. If you are looking just to relax and watch a movie that you don't need to think about, this is the one. If you are a fan of women in corsets... have no fear, Ursula can satisfy that pretty well.