The Movie

And with their immortal rallying cry "On Moishe! On Herschel! On Schlo-o-mo!", Porthos, Athos, Aramis, and D'Artagnan - the legendary heroes of Alexandre Dumas's classic 19th-Century novel The Three Musketeers - entered the annals of heroic literary legends, joining such esteemed company as Robin Hood, King Arthur, Gilgamesh, and Paste-Pot Pete. These defenders of the French crown have been portrayed on stage, screen, and television countless times, most famously portrayed in the 1970s films The Three Musketeers and The Four Musketeers by director Richard Lester, and featuring Sting, Rod Stewart, and Bryan Adams as the eponymous trio.

So here it is, the summer of 2004. The last notable representation of Dumas's heroes was 1993's abysmal The Three Musketeers, released by Disney and featuring the somewhat appalling casting of Charlie Sheen, Chris O'Donnell, Oliver Platt, and Keifer Sutherland as the leads. A lousy movie by even the most liberal of standards and the recipient of middling box-office returns, the film's indifferent reception almost condemned future Musketeer endeavors to oblivion.

But as the 21st Century rolled into being, Disney found itself with even bigger problems. Diminishing returns at the box office cast a pall over the future feasibility of traditional hand-drawn animation. The combined grosses of Brother Bear, Home on the Range, Treasure Planet, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire didn't even match the non-adjusted grosses of each of the last three Pixar pictures, either Shrek film, or some of the earlier modern Disney classics like The Lion King or Aladdin. Furthermore, Disney continued to cheapen their brand name with the continuing reliance on producing cheaply made and piss-poor quality animated sequels to their classic films. Witness the cavalcade of crap reflected by the likes of Hunchback 2, Cinderella 2, The Jungle Book 2, The Lion King 2, etc.. Sure, the short-term profits were there; these direct-to-video crapfests were cheap to produce and sold well on home video. But the long-term effects were underscored by the devaluation of Disney's reputation for quality and entertainment.

Well, that particular battle rages on. In the meantime, perhaps sensing how belittled their brand had become, Disney set out to capture the hearts and minds of families everywhere, but this time by bringing out The Big Guns. You guessed it: a home-video feature-length extravaganza featuring their three most recognizable and beloved characters: Bullwhip Griffin, Johnny Tremain, and the Fighting Prince of Donegal. Unfortunately the rights to these characters were tied up in royalties litigation with Tommy "The Turd" Robelli, so they instead turned to the iconic Mickey, Donald, and Goofy, colorful and endearing characters who have been entertaining fans for decades.

Or so it would seem. Despite the fact that these characters are the basic "goodwill ambassadors" for the Disney organization, the truth of the matter is that their glory days ended decades ago. Mickey, Donald, Goofy (and by extension Minnie, Daisy, and Pluto) are wonderfully entertaining characters, but aside from marketing, merchandising, and ice shows, not much has really been done with them since their halcyon days of decades past. They entertained us in countless shorts (one of my favorite pieces of animation since I was a wee turtle was the classic Mickey and the Beanstalk, featuring Mickey, Donald, and Goofy in a fantastic adaptation of "Jack and the Beanstalk"), but they weren't exactly relevant to newer generations of Disney fans. They were supplanted in popularity by the characters from the feature-length animated films: your average eight-year-old girl could probably quote you chapter-and-verse about Ariel from The Little Mermaid, Belle form Beauty and the Beast, or Mulan, but if you asked her about Minnie Mouse, the most she could probably say is that the character is "Mickey's girlfriend" and point to an autograph she got the last time she visited The Magic Kingdom.

So Disney has released The Three Musketeers, starring Mickey, Donald, and Goofy in a story that has nothing to do with Dumas's novel (indeed, they play themselves by name and not Porthos, Athos, and Aramis). Set in 17th-Century France, the trio play a group of janitors who find themselves promoted to the ranks of the Musketeers by Peg-Leg Pete, Captain of the Musketeers. But Pete has an agenda of his own: he secretly plans to take control of the kingdom by getting rid of Princess Minnie, and assigns the incompetent threesome the duty of being the Queen's Guard. This seemingly sets Minnie at ease after a botched assassination attempt (!), but Pete knows that the threesome's incompetence will make it much easier for his goons to get their paws on the Princess.

Will the good guys pull through by the end? Clearly if you don't know the answer to this question, you deserve to watch The Hunchback of Notre Dame 2. But thankfully, while this feature does not tread any new ground, and it's pseudo-hip anachronistic irreverence grows a little grating at times, The Three Musketeers is a welcome return-to-form for our favorite Disney heroes (the film features the return of Mickey, Donald, Goofy, Pluto, Minnie, Daisy, Peg-Leg Pete, and Clarabelle.) The quality of the animation is a step ahead of television quality and a big step behind feature quality, but this is a good looking film. The storyline is basic and often quite silly, guaranteeing a good time to be had by children of all sizes. It ain't a classic by any stretch of the imagination, but The Three Musketeers can't help itself by being a lot of fun.

The DVD

Video:

The Three Musketeers is presented in a widescreen aspect ratio of 1.78:1, and has been anamorphically enhanced for your widescreen-viewing joy of joys. The transfer is exceedingly well-delivered. The color scheme is epsecially rich and vibrant, with deep black levels and a beautifully lush palette. Image detail is spot-on: this is an exceedingly sharp picture, although often a tad too sharp. Some noticeable line wiggle is apparent at times, but this is a minor nitpick at best. The transfer itself is reasonably clean and free of compression noise.

Audio: