Phantom of the Opera (the Movie): A Review
Posted By Kathleen David on January 25, 2005
Behind the cut is anything I think might be spoilers and I erred on the side of the cut rather than have someone blast me for giving something away. So the replies do NOT have to be spoiler free. If you don
This film was my first introduction to Phantom, and I found that it just didn’t do it for me. I think it’s because I just didn’t like a lot of the songs; in a nutshell, it was Andrew Lloyd Webber’s fault, not the filmmakers’. I did adore Emmy Rossum in her role, and thought that the set and costume design were fantastic. Overall, I would recommend the film, if only because it’s a feast for the senses. My full thoughts can be found here (ouch, that was pretty shameless).
Not so shameless after all…I didn’t realize your comments don’t support HTML.
http://spaces.msn.com/members/jefflawson/Blog/cns!1pjG8cDC0riukjwoRdkt9I2w!286.entry
Geez, Jeff. you were enchanted by Anne Hathaway? Okay, I haven’t seen any of her movies, but I guess I should. Still, so far all the trailers make me think of Woody Allen in a dress, and I’ve never been that big a fan of Woody Allen.
Geez, Jeff. you were enchanted by Anne Hathaway?
I was surprised too. As for her movies, well THEY’RE not all that great…Ella Enchanted was pretty good, Princess Diaries was mediocre, and Princess Diaries 2 was a disaster. I’ve found her to have a great screen presence, though. Great smile. Doesn’t necessarily say much about her acting talents, as she hasn’t had to display a LOT of range in the movies I’ve seen her in.
Actually, I have to force myself to sit down soon and veg out on a lot of the new crop of female stars coming up. I mentioned earlier this week that I’m into scriptwriting, mostly romantic comedies, although I’m not limiting myself to that genre. That said, I have to keep in mind who’s likely to play any role I write. Since Meg Ryan’s getting on up there, as are Uma Thurman and Renee Zellwigger, there’s a good chance that some new actress like Anne Hathaway, Lindsay Lohan or (groan) Hillary Duff might be playing the female lead. the problem is that Disney is cranking them out left and right and frankly, I’m not that thrilled with any of them. Fortunately there’s still Katie Holmes, Allison Mack and Kristin Kruek out there.
Yeah, my thoughts on the Phantom were basically, “This guy’s good, but he’s no Crawford.” It makes you wonder what sort of past MC had that he was able to personify the role so well.
I saw the film with my mom, who’s the big Phantom Phreak in the family, and all she could talk about for days was Emily Rossum. The girl’s got some serious talent.
I didn’t care for the framing device when it crept in during the plot of the movie. I could have done just fine with Raoul driving away in the carriage at the start of the movie, and then seeing the carriage driveing to Christine’s grave at the end to start off the little epilogue (which I did rather like). Apparently, someone felt the audience needed to be reminded that all of this is Raoul’s memories. Well, we didn’t because we (or at least I) didn’t care. All the interstitals did was suck me out of the story.
“I didn’t care for the framing device when it crept in during the plot of the movie…All the interstitals did was suck me out of the story.”
Couldn’t agree more. The scenes at the beginning and end were great (the first one in particular, with its transtion to colour was well done), but the ones in the middle shouldn’t have been there. They were quite jarring.
I absolutely loved the movie. The costumes were exquisite. It is worth watching the movie just to see the costumes. The singing is well done however, as mentioned I missed Crawford.
I loved the movie but ALW has changed almost everything. First, Butler is not a Tenor. i loved the way Crawford sings. Old age but sings songs from poto in concert. How? He was Erik. If not, I’ll cast him as The Phantom in my show called the Phantoms of The Music. A little too gospel I would say because The Phantom lurks in the darkness with his partner, The Piano Ghost, which is my teacher earned their Angelic wings.