innersmiff

24 May 2012

A tad ridiculous but some honest fun

A short review.This film needs to be looked at again, not as a period epic but as somegood, honest entertainment. A "swashbuckler" in the true sense of theword, 'The Man In The Iron Mask' is worth a look.If you can believe the premise that the King Louis has a secret twinyou're half way to enjoying this film. Obviously the all-star cast is ahuge plus. Irons, Depardieu and Malkovich are awesome as usual and DiCaprio is decent. Do not expect a believable story because you will bedisappointed.It works best as a fairy tale and is fairly enjoyable if you watch itwith that frame of mind.

Jemi Denan

24 May 2012

Good drama and full of warrior language

I think it is the sequel of the three masketeers.A very good plot with full of warrior languages madethe movie just awesome.The ending is perfect.

Rvn1966

23 May 2012

Actors, not story!

The plot sounds pretty bad on paper: The Three Musketeers come out ofretirement to save France by replacing the King with an impostor. Thismovie could very well be another dullsville story. However, theperformances of Gerard Depardieu, Jeremy Irons, Gabriel Bryne and JohnMalkovich save this potential clunker. These actors shine every timethey're on screen. Depardieu is charming, Irons: dramatic, Bryne:tortured and Malkovich: intense. Together, all four save this movie andmake it a guilty pleasure to watch over and over again. However notmuch is said for DiCaprio, unfortunately. He is merely eye candy forthis piece and that's sad, considering he has so much potential.

blanche-2

23 May 2012

Familiar tale with a new cast

Leonardo DiCaprio is "The Man in the Iron Mask" and also King Louis XIVin this re-telling of the famous Dumas story. He is surrounded in asumptuous production by a stellar cast that includes Gabriel Byrne,John Malkovich, Gerard Depardieu and Jeremy Irons. The oft-filmed plotconcerns the twin brother of the cruel, selfish Louis IV who is guardedloyally by D'Artagnan. Phillipe, the twin, was taken from his mother atbirth and once found by the King, imprisoned and placed in an iron maskto hide his identity. When the poverty and the uprisings become toomuch, Aramis (Irons), who knows of Phillipe's existence, breaks him outof prison with the help of Porthos (Depardieu) and Athos (Malkovich)with the idea of having him replace Louis at an upcoming masqueradeball. It falls to Athos, who has just lost his son Raoul in war becauseof Louis' lust for Raoul's fiancée, to teach Philippe how to be king ina short time. Things do not go as planned.This tremendous cast and huge production make for absorbing viewing,different yet as entertaining as the Richard Chamberlain TV version andthe Louis Hayward version in the 1930s. Here the emphasis is on the oldMusketeers, which works well - Porthos who feels his age and misses theold lusts, the grieving Athos and Aramis, given an impossible job byLouis, which means that Louis must go; and, of course, D'Artagnan,fiercely loyal to his King and insisting that he can be molded into agreat ruler, despite evidence to the contrary. The acting is fabulous -there really isn't a standout among the four men as they are all sogood.Leonardo DiCaprio creates two completely different characters withLouis and Philippe and does an excellent job. Though he was trendingtoward matinée idol/chick flick territory, he pulled himself out totake on weightier roles - though there's no doubt this film was meantto bring in the teenagers. And what's wrong with that - a classic storyonce in a while won't kill them.Entertaining viewing.

23 May 2012

Love those Musketeers

DiCaprio was adequate, but I really enjoyed d'Atargnan, Porthos, Aramis, and Athos (in that order). Athos could have acted a little more European. Favorite scenes: The charge at the end ("if WE must die ...") and d'Artagnan hurling his sword at the would-be assassin toward the beginning.

nodira9

23 May 2012

waste of time

Unfortunately, the movie was disappointing. I thought script was tooboring with awkward silent gaps in-between and acting was probably evenworse both from male and female actors. Frankly, it was a waste of 2hours. Di Caprio was not able to portray the evil king or the iron manto full extent of his abilities. The mother and the girl wereastonishingly bad. D'Artanyan's statement:"My love is treasonous to myheart"....can we really expect this coming from a soldier? - romanticpoet - yeah maybe! And then there were scenes after the prisoner wasreleased. Who would want to spend time hidden in the room after beingreleased? Wouldn't one try to enjoy his freedom or at least get angryat Aramis who helped to put him in prison? After the guy took off hismask, the supporting actors' glances were like, yeah we see u and.....There was even a moment when Malkovich' sight was wondering around -wow, who edited the movie? Anyways, 3 out of 10 - is the max i cangive.

Gergana Koleva

19 May 2012

Marvellous

I watched it today again and I found it's inexhaustible. And I looked it'srating (5.9) and compared to the rating of "Die hard" (7.9).Guys, this is sick. "Die hard" ain't even a movie. It justsucks. Oh, I'm sorry, it's a movie, because somethings are moving. There is a very simple trick indeed. Watch the actors' eyes.Watch Gerard Depardieu or John Malkovich or Jeremy Irons or Leonardo diCaprio or (for that matter) Robert de Niro - their eyes are playing, becausethey live with their character. Now watch Bruce Willisplaying and find a difference in his eyes when he is suffering the mostdreadful events in his life and when he is buying a hot-dog - do you see anydifference(?)- because I don't. Oh, I actually quiteliked "Die hard", as I liked "The Fifth Element". Bruce Willis is farbetter, of course, than Jodie Foster or Julia Roberts , for which they are not at all to be blamed. It's just thattheir place is not before a camera. Nevermind, if you like "Pretty woman" (rating 6.6) more than "The man in the ironmask", you are not to be blamed either, for even sheep areGod's creatures. Thank you.

19 May 2012

Why does everyone love this movie?

I don't understand the appeal of this film.I cringed through the entire thing. Leonardo disappoints me more and more, the more I see him act. He was terrible in "Titanic." It is unfortunate how stardome has influenced his judgment choosing his films since "What's Eating Gilbert Grape" which was phenomenal. John Malchovick's performance was also a gargantuan let-down. He was desperately unconvincing as a loving father (he looked too young to be a father of a marraigable man, first of all) and his acting was so terrible you could have driven a semi through his lines. Leo was equally transparent in his character development, not to mention, completely unappealing physically. Get the boy a comb.

Boyo-2

19 May 2012

Good, entertaining movie

This movie did not deserve all the bad reviews it received. There areclunky moments, but they are few and far between and not that noticeable.Gabriel Bryne is great, and Leo is too!He does a terrific star turn. The audience I saw this with really enjoyedit, alot, and you probably will too.

anonymous

18 May 2012

What a great movie!!

This movie is very enjoyable and just plain fun to watch! Leo does seem abit too innocent to be playing the role of a seductive brat, but he doespull it off. He does well with his role. Everyone's acting is quite goodin this movie. It is a treat to watch and it is very interesting.Whetheryou like romantic period piece movies or not, I highly recommend thismovie!!

18 May 2012

An Excellent Movie

I've never read the book, so I came clean to the movie. The action sequences are good, the explanations as to what motivates the Musketeers are reasonable, and the performances are, for the most part, excellent. There is very little to complain about for this movie.Plus, we get to see Leonardo play two roles! :)Highest rating from me.

17 May 2012

Cant anyone buckle a swash anymore?

This is a reasonable interpretation of the classic story I suppose, it justlacks a few vital elements that make a decent movie in this genre, i.e.drama, excitement, characterisation, action etc etc. DiCaprio is prettypants as both evil King Louis and his nicer twin, although to be fair he'snot really given much to do; the evil one just has to sneer a bit while thegood one shambles about looking dumb all the time. The four musketeers,played by an international team of top actors, are also a bit dull, lackingboth the humour that made Richard Lester's Musketeer films so much fun andthe element of charisma and vitality that would convince the viewer thatthese are indeed the hardest men in the world. There's not much charactershown by anyone, so you never really start caring about the heroes or hatingthe villains, and there's virtually no action until the last ten minutes orso, where a few half-arsed swordfights are thrown in as if in afterthought.Pretty lame all round really.

artzau

17 May 2012

SPOILER WARNING!! THIS FILMS STINKS!

How can a guy who wrote a winner (Braveheart) and 5 fine actors, Bryne,Depardieu, Irons and Curry and one mediocre wannabe, DiCaprio, take a great,classic story by Dumas and turn it into a limp parody of an adventure film.UGH! Scenes where DiCaprio makes his bland transitions from the bad guyinto the good guy are bad enough, but when Depardieu goes to hang himselfand mutters, "Goodbye, cruel world," only to fall on his tush, is ghastly. And, Tim Curry's Snidley Whiplash version of the Cardinal only need to say,"Heh-heh, Heh!" to fill in the gaps. Bryne, Irons and Malkovich must havebeen paid a lot of money to do this dog. But, they did little service tothe film industry or medium in doing so. This film was made for the teenageset and even adds a teenage king and queen to an already limp storyline thatis merely a whisper of the fine original story. But, for those of us whohave seen some very fine productions of the original Dumas story, this isdisappointing to the max. It would do well for some of those younghormone-driven kids who found DiCaprio's flouncy performance "awesome," toread the original and then see this shallow characture.

Chrissi2

17 May 2012

Great Leo

The movie itself is nothing special. The dialogues are not very good (Orshould I say bad?) and often very superficial (I hate this dialoguebetweenRaoul and Christine... "I love you." "And I love you, Raoul."). So themovieis nice to watch but not great. And... It is my favourite movie! So why?Because Leo was great in it.I often heard even from other Leo fans that he was not bad enough asLouis.All I can say to them is read the book. You'll see that Louis isn'tdescribedas the typical onedimensional bad guy. In fact he's very similar to theLouis who Leo has played. I admit I was very surprised when I discoveredthis. I thought the book would present the king as cruel and heartless butit absolutly doesn't do it. So no one can blame Leo for not being badenoughas Louis because the only thing he did was playing the king how he'sdescribed in the book. BTW, I hate Aramis in the book.As Philippe Leo did a great job, too. You absolutly believe him that hewasin prison for six years wearing an iron mask. Right after he was freed bythe musketeers he's so shy and unsecure and then he gets hisself-confidenceslowly back but he's never a real tough guy. No wonder. Imagine, this manwas arrested when he was just a teen. They put him into the mask andnobodytold him why and then he suffered six years in prison. So he can't actlikea tough hero. That would be totally unlogical.I applaud Leo for his work in this film. He gave a damn onHollywood-clichesand shew us the truth. Go Leo!!!

Jason C. Atwood

14 May 2012

Fifty years too late in the making.

Journey way back to when moviegoers were thrilled by all the kings, queens,princes, chivalries, and masquerade parties. Fifty years later, it'll behard to appease anybody who'll be interested. Using the "old school" stylingapproach in film making, it feels like a modern-day 90s film with the usualtwists. The giant busty sculptures of 17th century broads might be new toyou if attention was paid little to endless reruns of HERCULES and XENA.Anyway, Leonardo DiCaprio is the main attraction here. For acting purposes,he's more of a role model this time compared to what he did brilliantly inTITANIC. Don't you think pretty young gals will fall in love with him? Hisown double as the man in the iron mask is worthy of interest, but overall,he hardly does anything except for having sex and dressing up in costumes.More action sequences would be greatly appreciated along with a greaterinterest for the much older generation who grew up watching movies based onthe its given theme. It's hard to take recent movies too seriously as theytry hard to evolve. THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK is just adequate enough torival a Hollywood golden oldie, but it comes up real short on innovation.Too late.

14 May 2012

Closest to the idea of the Musketeers.

I know that every movie should be judged independent of it's source material, but I have a really hard time when it comes to Dumas' stories. He just did them so well that I find it hard to watch my favorite charaters get butchered on screen. This movie didn't do that so bad. They butchered the story, and many of the charaterizations were just wrong, somehow I think this movie captured the spirit or essence of the novels beter than other movies.That being said now I need to review this as a movie independent of the novel. Most of the performances were good, the direction was adaquite, but the story was flawed, though beter than any other version of the Iron Mask I've seen. More or less it is a good adventure that is quite fun to watch, though it leaves no lasting impression.

12 May 2012

A wonderful movie for anyone who loves outstanding movies.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays the intriguing and cold-hearted villain, and also his charming, naive twin brother. The great Louie the sixteenth has unjustly sentenced his twin brother to live in a mask for forever (until he dies), for fear of losing reign of France. So Phillippe lives in a cold iron mask until the Three Musketeers free him, with a plan to switch Louie and Phillippe, since Louie is so mean. Ending with a legendary show of bravery and courage, the battle scene is the best part. Truly a gem of a movie, this is a must-see and also a must-have. A little inappropriate, at times, for a young child, but there's always the old cover-the-eyes-with-the-hand. I don't think, though, that violence or sexuality is a reason not to see this truly magnificent work of art.

11 May 2012

Another good leo movie

Well I still manitain leonardo dicaprio is the best actor ever after viewing this film. There is not a movie he makes that I don't like. If you want to see a good dual role, check this one out.

11 May 2012

Gorgeous Film, but too Ambitious

The film dives into too many characters and winds up distracting from the main plot. It's over 2 hours long and will feel that way when you watch it. Not enough time was spent on the 2 main characters (Phillipe and his twin), so you feel deprived when it's over. Way too many scenes showing the sexuual trysts of one of the Musketeers, played by Gérard Depardieou. He is shown doing a threesome, a twosome, a onesome (O.K we get it, the ladies dig him). The settings and the costumes are gorgeous. With a Better screenplay , this could have been a great film. Needed more Leonardo time and less Gerard.

10 May 2012

Leo just couldnt complete with the other 4

People are going on about Leo's back acting. It wasn't that great to be sure, especially with the lack of appropriate accent. But stacking him next to 4 amazing veteran actors is what made him seem horribly bad. Leo wasn't too bad in Titanic, but he just can't compete with Jeremy Irons, Gabriel Byrne, John Malkovich or Gerard Depardieu... not even close. The movie is flawed and two dimensional, but it's still enjoyable as long as you're watching it for one of the older and better four and not DiCaprio. Also check the French movie "Revenge of the Musketeer." Really good.