Product Description

It’s “All for One and One for All” as Barbie™ and her friends co-star in Barbie™ and The Three Musketeers! Join Barbie™ as Corinne™, a young country girl headed to Paris to pursue her big dream – to become a female musketeer! Never could she imagine she would meet three other girls who secretly share the same dream! Using their special talents, the girls work together as a team to foil a plot and save the prince. Come along on an action-filled adventure that dares you to dream as never before.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #223 in DVD
• Brand: Barbie
• Released on: 2009-09-15
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Formats: AC-3, Animated, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Dubbed in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 81 minutes

Amazon.com
A girl can be anything she wants to be if she works hard, but in the days of the musketeers, certain professions were simply off-limits. Corinne (Barbie) is the daughter of a Musketeer and grew up wanting to become a musketeer and training hard to become an excellent swordsperson. When she sets off for Paris to join the musketeers, even her letter of introduction earns nothing but laughs from Captain Treville and the all-male musketeers. Forced to take a job as a castle housekeeper, Corinne soon discovers that her three fellow housekeepers have also dreamed and trained to become musketeers. Even more amazing is that the senior housekeeper had similar dreams as a child. This elder housekeeper provides further training for the three girls, encouraging them to strive to achieve what was an absolute impossibility for her generation. Just as the prince is about to become king, strange accidents begin to occur around the castle--accidents that the men musketeers seem unable to prevent. Could these unfortunate events provide an opportunity for Corinne and her friends to showcase their extraordinary swordsmanship? While the concept of Barbie as a sword-wielding musketeer may initially seem rather odd, the film is just as believable as other Barbie productions and it is refreshing to see Barbie in a somewhat less overtly-feminine role. Barbie's final quotation sums it all up nicely: "True courage is pursuing your dream, even when everyone else says it's impossible." (Ages 3 to 7) --Tami Horiuchi

Customer Reviews

Let the Adventure Begin! -- a review of "Barbie and the 3 Musketeers"
In this re-write of Dumas' "The Three Musketeers", Barbie is a country lass named Corinne. Like her deceased father, who just happens to have been D'Artagnan, it is her dream to serve and protect the royal family. But unlike her father she faces even more difficulties in getting to prove herself worthy of the Musketeer title because she is a girl.

This then is the pivotal point of the plot, that girls can do whatever they want if they are willing to train for it and not let others squash there dreams. And, in fact, this theme is extended to include everyone, even the Prince of France, who feels like he will have to give up his scientific interests once he becomes king.

Corrine is joined in this adventure by 3 other girls, who also happen to want to be Musketeers. They are all athletic and bright, differing though in their interests. One quotes poetry, one plays the violin, and so forth. But because they are girls they end up working as housekeepers in the palace until they discover that there is a plot against the prince's life. Then they are called upon to use all of their skills and inner strength to try to foil the plot.

There is the usual music and dance numbers, as well as the usual avoidance of violence in this film. The talking animals include a mean-spirited dog, Corrine's cat, and a horse named Alexander.

Talking Points:::

I really liked the strong themes in the movie. Like every Barbie film there's a good underlying message and exemplary behavior.

I thought the music was excellent. It's a little more trendy than in previous Barbie movies, and I'm even thinking about seeing if there's a DVD we can purchase.

I thought the animation was not as good as in her other movies. However we saw this at the theater so that may have made small imperfections appear worse than they would at home.

Overall, a very good movie. I give it 4 Stars because some of the plotting was inferior to previous movies, and if you could only purchase one Barbie video for your child, I would suggest that Barbie Barbie in The Nutcracker and Barbie Barbie As The Princess and the Pauper were better choices.

Pam T~

Preposterous, but my kids loved it

Mattel's latest gender-reversed classic in the "Barbie" animated series begins on a farm in Gascony where Corinne, daughter of the famous D'Artagnan, is practicing her swordfighting moves. (Her idea of swordfighting seems to owe more to the "Zorro" films than anything you would actually expect to find in 17th century France, but never mind.)

Corinne's life's ambition is to follow in her father's footsteps by becoming a royal musketeer. When she turns 17 she goes to Paris to enlist, carrying as D'Artagnan had before her, a letter of introduction to Monsieur de Treville, who is still Captain of the King's musketeers. (With the silver hair which is the only sign of age in this kind of film.)

Unfortunately for Corinne, the 17th century French authorities are not ready for the idea of a lady musketeer (probably this reluctance is the most plausible part of the film.) So instead she has to accept a job as a maid at the palace.

Just as D'Artagnan fell foul of "the three musketeers" on his first day in Paris and agreed to fight duels with each of them, Corinne has unfortunate meetings with three other girls while attempting to rescue her pet cat from an unpleasant dog belonging to the film's villain, and then finds that they are her new work colleagues.

Despite this unfortunate start, Corinne becomes friends with her new colleagues and it turns out that all four share an ambition to be royal musketeers. So they begin to train in secret.

Meanwhile the handsome Prince Louis, heir to the throne, is about to be crowned King on reaching his majority. His cousin Phillipe, who has been ruling France as Regent while Louis was a child, is less than happy at handing over power. Phillipe's nefarious plans are about to run into a most unexpected obstacle ...

From my adult perspective this was quite the most ridiculous of all the Barbie films - the fact that the music to the climax of the film was the song "unbelievable" seemed only too appropriate. But this isn't aimed at adults, it's aimed at little girls and I have to report that my eight year old daughter loved it, as did her twin brother. And in fact some of the jokes in the film are quite funny: they had my wife as well as our children laughing out loud and raised a few smiles even from me.

It has all the stock Barbie ingredients - a relentlessly positive heroine, a wicked villain, good and bad talking animals, etc. Like all the Barbie films "Barbie and The Three Musketeers" is also beautifully made, charming, and, if my daughter is anything to go by, can hold the attention of a little girl for hours.

Before we first rented any of the Barbie videos for my daughter, I was expecting them to be trite, over-commercialised, and over-sugary. In general, however, I have been pleasantly surprised.

Yes, they do have a lot of commercial spin-offs and a high saccharine count, but the quality of that film and the other Barbie videos we have subsequently bought or rented, was significantly higher than I had originally expected before I saw the first one. They have kept my children engrossed for hours - including my son as well as my daughter - and also introduced them to some beautiful stories. Several of them also introduced my children to some great musical classics: others, of which this is one, had instead enjoyable original or modern music. In all cases Mattel had hired first class international orchestras to provide the instrumental soundtrack.

On more than one occasion I have been listening to a CD of a classic such as Beethoven's pastoral symphony (Beethoven: Symphony No.6), or "The Queen of the Night's aria" from Mozart's opera "Mozart: The Magic Flute", and my daughter, who was then five years old, recognised and expressed appreciation of the music, and correctly remembered which Barbie film had used it. ("Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus" and "Barbie Fairytopia: Mermaidia" respectively.)

The music for "Barbie and the three musketeers" is easy on the ear, though this is not one of those Barbie films - there are some - which you would buy for the music.

For reference, the Barbie films with beautiful musical scores taken largely from the classics include

"Barbie of Swan Lake" (with music from the ballet of that name)
"Barbie in The Nutcracker" (ditto)
"Barbie and the Magic Of Pegasus" (Beethoven)
"Fairytopia II: Mermaidia" (Mozart)
"Barbie in the 12 dancing princesses dvd" (Mendelsohn)
"Barbie in a Christmas Carol" (various traditional carols)

The two best with music which is original rather than taken from the classics, are "Barbie as The Island Princess" and "Barbie As The Princess and the Pauper" the music for which I can particularly recommend.


In terms of production values, the DVD runs smoothly and is fairly easy to navigate around: it is as visually beautiful as any of the Barbie films to date, which is quite a high standard, and contains a few extras such as games.

Those people who enjoy criticising the way Mattel operate the Barbie franchise will not have much difficulty finding things in these films to sneer at. If you, or more importantly your kids, are allergic to an excess of twee sweetness, then these DVDs and the Barbie videos generally may not be for them.

One charge which is sometimes made against the Barbie films but which does not hold much water is the idea that they reinforce gender stereotypes, and that criticism does not appear at all applicable to this particular film. It's a gender reversed story, and the heroine and central character is far more interested in foiling plots against the King than in going on a date with him.

To summarise, these films are beautifully made, and will hold the attention of most small children for long enough for the typical exhausted parent to clear the mess they have made in several rooms of the house or collapse for an hour's rest after doing so. And there are enough more sophisticated jokes thrown in that you won't be completely bored to death if you decide to watch "Barbie and the Three Musketeers" with your offspring.

Not as good as past Barbie movies
My two daughters love the Barbie movies, especially Barbie and the Diamond Castle and Barbie and the 12 Dancing Princesses. So we could hardly wait to get Barbie and the Three Musketeers.
My girls love the movie and are running around pretending to be musketeers now! However, I am disappointed. The songs don't fit the movie well and are not easy to sing along with like my girls prefer. Also, I am all for girl empowerment, I strongly want my girls to feel they can accomplish anything they want. However; I strongly object to women gaining power by trying to belittle men. The prince was a weak dreamer who cowered as Corrine (Barbie) fought for him! Would it have be so bad for them both to have been fighting the bad guys?
On the positive side, I do like the themes of working hard to gain your goals and teamwork that were portrayed. Also, the cute byplay of the animals from previous movies was there. (A little too much like Princess and the Pauper as it is the good cat and horse vs. the mean bully dog, but it doesn't detract from the movie.)