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The Three Musketeers

A Gascon hothead rides into Paris, picks three fights before breakfast, and swears himself to Athos, Porthos, and Aramis. Fred Niblo’s 1921 silent spectacular — produced by and starring Douglas Fairbanks — is Dumas at a sprint: diamond studs, Richelieu’s spies, the queen’s honor, and swordplay that Fairbanks (already the king of the form after The Mark of Zorro) performs himself, including a legendary one-handed handspring off a dagger. Niblo, who would go on to Ben-Hur, keeps the court intrigue readable while Fairbanks turns d’Artagnan into pure motion. Released through United Artists, it minted the Hollywood swashbuckler and later spawned Fairbanks’s own sequel, The Iron Mask. All for one, and one for the stunt.

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