The Musketeer (2001) Peter Hyams   It seems odd that yet another re-make of Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers should be produced so shortly after the 1993 film adaptation of this story. In any case, for this new version, director Peter Hyams (2010), sought to blend the European swashbuckling genre with the frenetic combat of Hong Kong martial arts movies. An intriguing idea, but the film does not offer much that is particularly fresh or inventive. Overall, the production is visually quite good, boasting of fine photography (Hyams served as cinematographer as well as director) and some impressively acrobatic fight scenes choreographed by Xin Xin Xiong (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). Likewise, the action sequences and the overall pace of the film are invested with good energy and propulsion by editor Terry Rawlings (Alien). But the human elements-the adaptation of Dumas' story, and more especially, the characters-are pure cardboard. Former Calvin Klein model Justin Chambers plays the hero, D'Artagnan. While Chambers can swing his sword with conviction, he is otherwise out of place among a cast with far superior acting ability, and the romance between D'Artagnan and leading lady Francesca (Mena Suvari) is more like something out of Us Magazine than from a classic Dumas novel. However, the Musketeers themselves, and their normally distinct personalities, tend to blur together in this production, with the exception of Tim Roth (as the villainous Febre), who steals the show, snarling with cold-blooded menace in one of his best roles since Rob Roy. David Arnold's score follows in the footsteps of the Korngold/John Williams tradition, with requisite heroic brass and romantic strings, but like so much else in this film, it just feels formulaic. The screenplay is also deeply flawed, and its attempts at clever dialog is embarrassingly contrived. For a film whose director was apparently aiming for something new and different, The Musketeer offers nothing of the kind. For certain there is some interesting stuntwork, but the filmmakers' regard for both the characters and the story trails far behind. When one considers the plethora of far better Dumas adaptations readily available at the local video rental counter, there is not much to recommend this film. —Paul Andrew MacLean

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