There have been no less than two dozen film adaptations of Alexander Dumas’ famous novel (including the just-released version featuring Orlando Bloom and Mila Jovovich). But none can match the endlessly entertaining thrills of Richard Lester’s 1973 take on the classic. His imagining of 17th-century France has a lived-in believability: coarse, dirty, and wondrously alive. There’s a similar realism in the film’s numerous fight scenes (choreographed by William Hobbs) notable for their emphasis on the exertions of physical combat—clashes that begin with expert thrusts and parries and soon devolve into a tangle of wild swings that often miss their mark. And anchoring all this excitement are the lead performances: Messrs. York, Finlay, Chamberlain, and (especially) Reed make for a fighting foursome united by the idea of “Tous pour un, un pour tous!“
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjVtGE-bHTg]