The Three Musketeers

The 1948 "Three Musketeers" is big time, Golden Age Hollywood filmmaking at its best. With big stars, lavish costumes, great sets, and lots of practical stuntwork, this Technicolor gem is as much fun today as it was the day it first screened.

Gene Kelly stars as D'Artagnan in this adaptation, and it's a terrific casting choice. Since filmed swordplay is basically dancing, putting an accomplished dancer in the role allows the fight choreographer to have some fun with his sequences. Kelly leaps, flips, thrusts, and parries with aplomb, convincing us that he is a hell of a swordsman. Combine this with his everyman attitude, and we believe in him as a rube just in from the country. His new comrades (Van Heflin, Gig Young, and Robert Coote) appear to be having a wonderful time, lending the proceedings precisely the devil-may-care attitude they need to capture Dumas's tone.

But you can't have heroes without villains. With Lana Turner as the Lady De Winter and Vincent Price as Cardinal Richelieu, our heroes are up against the very best. It's a pleasure to watch them all do their work.

It doesn't end there, however. Check out the undercard: June Allyson as Constance, Angela Lansbury as Queen Anne, Frank Morgan as King Louis the XIII, and Keenan Wynn as Planchett. Was there anyone sitting in the MGM cafeteria who didn't get roped into this thing?

All those names aren't enough for you, eh? Well, you can always enjoy the pretty pictures. MGM's costumers put some velvet wholesaler's kid through college with this one, with one lavish getup after another. It's wonderful, in that Golden Age way. Similarly, its set designers went to the trouble of getting every little detail just right, even if the location worked screamed "California." (An aside: the Musketeers are riding down a beach along the English Channel. Observed my 8-yr-old, "Hey, isn't that the beach from 'Planet of the Apes'?" That's my boy!)

But the fight scenes are what really sell this movie. I love practical stuntwork, and "The Three Musketeers" features some impressive stunts. You have the standard jumping on and off of horses, which we're used to, by now. But there are a number of multilevel falls that look challenging and authentic, and the swordplay is uniformly terrific.

In other words, the 1948 "The Three Musketeers" is great fun. Thanks again, TCM, for another wonderful presentation.

Nanny McPhee

I absolutely adored Emma Thompson's NANNY MCPHEE.

The film takes a reliable formula, a nanny shows up and squares away an intractable household, and works magic with it. Emma Thompson is marvelous as the titular nanny, Colin Firth turns in fine work as the hapless widowed father, Kelly MacDonald is utterly luminous as the scullery maid with a fairy-tale ending in store for her, and brilliant actors Angela Lansbury, Derek Jacobi, and the young Thomas Sangster prove that there's no such thing as a small role.

NANNY MCPHEE looks great, with a palette that reminds both that we're watching a fairy tale and that, in this world, everything will turn out fine. Its Thompson - penned dialogue sparkles, Patrick Doyle's score perfectly complements the action, and the film's ending is remarkably satisfying. This film does everything it sets out to do, and it does it with uninetrrupted excellence. Watch this one with the kids, or watch it alone - regardless, everyone in the room is guaranteed to have a good time.

While I'm writing about one of her works, allow me to take a moment to appreciate the remarkable career of Emma Thompson. When I first noticed her in HENRY V, she was just another beauty. From there, she went on to DEAD AGAIN, MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, and HOWARD'S END, just to name a few. She took home a BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY Oscar for Sense and Sensibility, and her career hasn't slowed down since. She effortlessly moves from small pieces like THE WINTER GUEST to blockbusters like the HARRY POTTER series without missing a beat, and she's consistently smart, affecting, and wonderful in everything she does.

What a marvelous talent.