Phantom of the Opera (Universal Studios Classic Monster Collection)
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Movie Reviews of Phantom of the Opera (Universal Studios Classic Monster Collection)
Movie Review: Didn't Follow the Book A Lot
Summary: 3 Stars
Ok, it was a pretty good movie, but it didn't follow the book a lot. I noticed a mistake too (I'm not picky, I just love finding mistakes in movies)! When the Phantom is sawing the chain holding the chandiler, after a while, he moves to the other side of the link, then it shows the performance again, and when it shows him sawing again, he's sawing on the side he was originally on. It sounds a little confusing. Claude Raines didn't get enough screen time, I think, and the other characters got plenty of time. It didn't seem fair.Movie Review: A good classic mystery film
Summary: 3 Stars
Yes, this film was ptetty good. It is not that close to the actual novel but I like that. Not every version can be that close to the novel because it would be boring; we'd just be watching the same things over snd over. Really good costumes and music. The sets really successfully give an 1800s mood with the candle light and horses. Pretty good for a film made in 1942. Some of the opera scenes get a littlt boring if you don't apriciate that stuff but the film sticks to historical acuracy.Movie Review: Pretty Good
Summary: 3 Stars
Not my favorite interpretation of Phantom, but still good. Susanna Foster kind of bugs me, but that's okay. And they really changed the story. It's not at all like the origional novel, but it's about Phantom, and that's a good enough excuse for me! Anyways, it was pretty nice. The Raoul character was most realistic. I just don't like Susanna. :)Movie Review: No title.
Summary: 3 Stars
A little dry for my taste. Naughty Marietta is still my favorite Nelson Eddy movie.Movie Review: Love quadrangle in the 40's
Summary: 2 Stars
Classic tale, told with a dated look, likeable but also empty.
What's more amazing is the life story of "Susanna Foster" (Christine Dubois), loved by three ardent men and adored by hundreds in this fiction, and living a downhill life in real life.
It's interesting for opera buffs like myself to see a bit of the "backstage" of the renowned Paris Opera, the jealousies, miseries and intrigues. The best phrase, by far, is the one put into the mouth of "Liszt": "So many crimes have been committed in the name of music, we may well make one to prevent one" (but better said). There's also a joke that's actually fun made by the music director, at least the audience agreed with me when we saw it.
The characters are made in cardboard, as fake as the scenery. "Vereheres" is a case in point.
Specially what Neil Doyle from U.S.A. points out in IMDB: "silly routines as they compete for the hand of Foster".
As Gary F. Taylor "GFT" (Biloxi, MS USA) writes in Amazon: "The Phantom had gone musical. (...) But in terms of actual story interest, the film is only so-so". It has a "sanitized" tone, surely explained by it being made during the war. I also agree to his: "pace is slow, sometimes to the point of clunkiness".
The only acting I liked was the one of Claude Rains. Find his complete quote in IMDB: "Often we'd secretly like to do the very things we discipline ourselves against..".
He's got very beautiful (albeit mad) lines while he's taking Christine to the Opera's catacombs. But they get muddled into the whole pastiche...
Music is very good, specially if you've heard the operas before. I liked the scene with Oneguin a lot, found it fun and refreshing.
As many reviewers write, there's no horror, just a musical. And the phantom is NEVER seductive, unless you can call a destructive mad wreck of a human being so.
Funnily enough, the main characters have chic French surnames (Dubois, D'Aubert), which leads me to confirm that at least some Americans think French equals chic. Whereas the "baddies" are Italian "Signor Ferretti", and the mischievous Biancarolli. "Italian means mafia" for Hollywood? The stereotype is long lived...
The jokes are tart, the heroines wear too much makeup, and the villain never really convinces as a menace. The ending is fine, truly!
After watching this, I don't feel sorry for having missed the 2004 remake by Schumacher, nor paying a dime and spent valuable time in London to watch the L. Weber musical.
Well, Joel has made some the worse films ever, ie "Bad company"... And Lloyd Webber... Woody Allen says it all in a subtle second of his masterful "Match Point".
I guess it's good to watch films like this or the superior King Kong (1933) with the helpful aide of an art house critic, who can enlighten the uninitiated -like me- to things like the gothic element underlying the rococo exterior. Or the romantic idea of beauty leading to suffering.
While it doesn't achieve cult status, it's a nice addenda to any "Phantom completist", as another reviewer puts it.
Overall, much less than anticipated. "Beauty and the beast" but without the emotion that the old Kong can yield.