The rules on any adaptation of “The Three Musketeers” are that it’s got to be swashbuckling and that it must be fun.

Disney landed the latter and made a decent showing of the former in their 1993 “Young Guns” version (Kiefer Sutherland, Oliver Platt et al). But the gold standard for this most famous, most filmed of action tales remains the early ’70s two-part all-star Richard Lester romp featuring Michael York, Richard Chamberlain, Faye Dunaway and Raquel Welch.

The latest French incarnation of this very French tale — the eighth French film version — leans more on the swashing buckles than the slapstick or witty repartee. But “The Three Musketeers — Part 1: D’Artagnan” is a lavishly-produced, full-blooded and entertaining take on the three-plus-one swordfighting team.

Director Martin Bourboulon (“Eiffel,” “Daddy or Mommy”) recycles some settings and finds a few new and novel places to have his duelists throw down. And he and screenwriter Mathieu Delaporte and Alexandre de La Patellière find a few surprises for François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Romain Duris and Pio Marmaï to act-out in their cliffhanger “Part 1.”

The four-billed-as-three musketeers are well-cast, with veterans Cassel and Duris lending gravitas and soulfulness, Civil the very embodiment of brash southern mountain “Gascon” hick come to join the King’s Musketeers in Paris, and Marmaï given a new wrinkle to play in the usually portly, food-and-fun-loving Porthos. This time, he’s a gay (Bisexual?) gastronome.

Human or edible livestock, “a thigh is a thigh,” Porthos bellows (in French with English subtitles).

Anbody who has ever seen a version of this tale remembers its waypoints. This time, the context — an heirless king of France (the excellent Louis Garrel of “Little Women” and “The Innocent”) is about to be cornered into a 1620s war with the Catholic country’s Protestants, who are backed by the British — is a bit clearer.

Louis tries to keep his court and his musketeers in line.

“I’ve never been,” he cracks, “but I hear it’s worse in England.”

The king’s double-crossing advisor/proxy Cardinal de Richelieu (Eric Ruf) is reduced in sinister scale in this production. But the Cardinal’s murderous henchwoman Milady is given a deadly edge by Eva Green, the real casting coup here.

The “meet cute” between the boyish would-be recruit D’Artagnan (Civil of “Rise” and “A Place to Fight For”) and droll, fatalistic Athos (Cassel of “Black Swan”), the chivalrous lady’s man Aramis (Duris of “Waiting for Bojangles”) and smiling, brawling Porthos (Marmaï, featured in “Yannick”) is more perfunctory than the usual “cute.”

D’Artagnan offends his three future comrades in turn, remember, and they all challenge the rural oaf to a duel.

“Three duels in three hours? If I didn’t have to kill you, I’d buy you a drink!”

A new ticking clock element is introduced into the countdown to an almost-cheating queen (Vicky Krieps of “Phantom Thread”) getting caught and outed with her British spy paramour, the Duke of Buckingham (Jacob Fortine-Lloyd). As always, D’Artagnan’s go-between landlady (Lyna Khoudri) is involved, maybe up to her neck.

There’s one seriously illogical bit of business set on a cliffside that may stick in your side the way it does in mine. But I like the prologue that introduces D’Artagnan and us to the “conspiracy” going on all around them straight from the start. The fights have a long-take choreographed brio about them. And the finale is so over-the-top that it plays, even if it plays like scores of modern thrillers, going back to Hitchcock, looking for a very public place to make a very bloody statement as a climax.

This version of the story has a few funny moments, but plays things straight and still manages to be a rewarding and enjoyable remake of this story of “Tous pour un” and “one for all.” Maybe they’ll find more of the “fun” in the second half/”sequel” — “The Three Musketeers — Part 2: Milady.”

Rating: unrated, violence

Cast: François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Romain Duris, Pio Marmaï, Lyna Khoudri, Louis Garrel, Eric Ruf, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd and Eva Green.

Credits: Directed by Martin Bourboulon, scripted by Mathieu Delaporte and Alexandre de La Patellière, based on the novel by Alexandre Dumas. A Samuel Goldwyn release.

Running time: 2:01