An Experiment in Expression

Yay!

Thu, 15 May 2008 12:01:54 GMT

It's John's birthday! (I won't tell you how old he is, but it's not very. Don't listen to his whines.)

Have a happy one, love. :)

Saturday morning disaster

Sat, 10 May 2008 18:16:16 GMT

About five minutes ago, John knocked our one, lonely, remaining wine glass on the floor and shattered it. Unfortunately for me, I was holding one of the kittens, Achilles, in my arms at the time, and the resounding crash so panicked her that she clawed her way free to hide under the couch.

Also unfortunately for me, I was wearing a sports bra (I was in Saturday morning cleaning/workout mode). I now have huge slashes, some of them bleeding mildly, across both breasts and my collarbone. There is also a perfect paw-sized star of four bleeding puncture wounds on my right shoulder, over which Achilles made her escape.

While I was weeping and bleeding, John proceeded to yell at me for leaving the wine glass where he could knock it over. Some words were exchanged.

Then I cried, a lot, because oh my god. Attempts to explain to John why this hurt so much were about 50% successful. My chest looks like someone attacked me with a cheese grater. A cheese grater that leaves wounds that swell. We poured peroxide on it for antiseptic purposes and I swore like a sailor.

I would include pictures of the devastation so no one could accuse me of overreacting, but you guys don't really need to see my cleavage.

So, yeah. Off to find lunch now and try not to be extraordinarily uncivil to everyone in my path. John is being his sweet, conscientious self and promising to buy me food and pet me until I stop behaving like an angry, rabid animal.

The Phantom Project: The Phantom of the Opera by Lawrence Rosen & Paul Schierhorn

Fri, 09 May 2008 20:22:09 GMT

Didn't I just write a review? Holy crap, I did. However, I figured that since I was stuck at home sick anyway, I might as well watch a DVD since I'm usually trying desperately to fit movie-watching into my schedule. The next one on my list is technically Pachard's The Phantom of the Cabaret, but John, who was leading an MMORPG raid complete with microphone and conference-call program, expressed some discomfort with the idea of there being funky music in the background while he was trying to marshal his forces. I conceded that it was probably somewhat discombobulating for his raiders to try to focus on their positioning and attack speed when his orders were accompanied by all the bow-chicka-wow-wow, so I put that one off for a bit later in deference to his wishes.

The Phantom of the Opera by Lawrence Rosen & Paul Schierhorn, 1990
Starring David Staller, Elizabeth Walsh & Christopher Rath
Grade: C-

This is a strange one to try to review. It's a stage musical written for the Hirschfield Theatre in Florida, but no cast recording was ever released; instead, it's available as a DVD, which is a recording of a live performance in front of a live audience. Of course, theatrical productions and movies are very different, so despite the efforts of director Darwin Knight to spice things up a bit, it doesn't really have much going for it in a film context. It was a hard beastie to try to analyze in this weird polyglot format, but I muddled on through to the end anyway.

The first thing I noticed was that the quote on the back of the DVD case claimed proudly that Varity magazine was quoted as saying that this was "more challenging and complex than the Weber version". This did not bode well. I can understand that pretty much any stage adaptation is going to have to deal with the looming shadow of Webber's incredibly popular show, but if the production team isn't even spelling his name right, I'm not sure if I can attach much credence to their claims. I need bumper stickers to pass out. Copy-Editing: It's Not Optional.

I wasn't really sure how to break this down: not by songs like a cast recording, since there was quite a bit of non-musical action, but I also wanted to avoid doing a large, smeary morass like my movie reviews usually turn out to be. Stage shows are generally a little more structured. I finally ended up breaking it down by scene the same way they did for the DVD menus, so each scene includes both some dialogue and a musical number.

Prologue: Spirit of Music

The cover copy claims that this is a "stately dream ballet", but that appears to be a well-intentioned untruth. Before anyone gets cranky about my lack of expert status here, I'll own up: I am a ballet dunce. I really just don't "get" ballet most of the time. I can enjoy it as an art form and I sure think those dancers up there are dadburned purty, but when it comes to which arch of the neck is meant to convey fiery burning passion and which is supposed to mean the endless heartbreak of a thousand broken love affairs, I'm totally lost. (In case anyone was wondering, that's why none of the ballet interpretations of the Phantom story are on my list--my notes would all look like "blah blah blah use of cellos blah blah blah contrapuntal dissonance blah blah blah Romantic tone pattern influences blah blah blah oh, and the dancers look very pretty in their leotards.")

Now, all that said, I don't think this is a stately anything. It's barely a ballet, at least as I understand ballet; there's some pointing and some twirling and a few hops, yeah, but it seems to be mostly a lot of waving of the arms in semi-dramatic poses, which looks sort of unfortunate on stage and completely unfortunate on film. The purpose of this bizarre little prequel is to show us Christine's pre-existing relationship with Raoul, from the childhood scarf-rescuing episode. Unfortunately, it doesn't come off very well overall; what's intended to be dreamily surreal is instead befuddlingly incomprehensible, and the voiceovers that are provided so that the dancers don't have to speak are almost hysterical in their badness. Voiceovers are a tough thing to do, and I respect that, but the fact is that not everybody can be a voice actor. These people may be able to do wonderful things when their bodies are involved as well, but their voices alone made me indecisive (specifically, I was torn between sniggers and depression at the state of modern theatre).

The intended backstory doesn't really come through, either, obscured as it is by the insistence on a dream-like presentation that isn't really working. Like many other things that will come up later in the show, much of understanding what's going on seems to hinge on the assumption that the audience has read Leroux's novel, which at this point is not a safe assumption at all (as I've noted before, many people just aren't up on their classic French literature, especially in the USA). For example, there's a lengthy lullabye-like song about the "Spirit of Music", sung (apparently... it's hard to tell with all the voiceovers) by a portly old guy who is standing in the mist playing a violin. Of course, I saw the violin and realized that this was meant to be Christine's father, but not until halfway through the song (at which point the repetition of the lyric "my child" suddenly made sense). Had I not read the book, I would have had no idea who that man was, what he was doing there, or why he did not reappear after the ballet. I might have figured it out later, when Christine is warbling on about her father, but it'd be a crapshoot.

And there's also the little fact that the titling tells us that the year is 1901. Say what, now? Anyone want to explain to me why we've suddenly set the story 20 years in the future? No one wants to explain this to me until we get into the story proper later, at which point it will kind of make sense, but not really.

Scene One: Spirit of Music (Part 2)

I was already filled with dread by the frankly awful singing voice of the underaged Christine in the prologue, but was mercifully rescued by adult Christine's lovely voice. Elizabeth Walsh is obviously a well-trained classical vocalist, and her ability was one of the major things that saved this show from being administered a greater beating than it's actually getting. My feeling overall for this show is that it has an excellent cast who have very little to work with in terms of dialogue and range, and are stuck making the best of a mediocre piece. Elizabeth Walsh's voice is lovely--but that's all I can really tell you about it, because the truth is that I've already forgotten most of the things she sang due to their unmemorable and overall ho-hum musicality. It's not her fault; she'd have sounded beautiful singing nursery rhymes, but unfortunately she might as well have been for all the impact the text or arrangements had on me.

Speaking of having little to work with, welcome to the plot. This show is a drastically shortened and cut down version of the story, and the result is a lot of patently ridiculous plot holes that are more distracting than streamlining. The Phantom just suddenly shows up (vocally) in Christine's dressing room one night and starts correcting her technique; when she understandably wants to know who the disembodied voice giving her orders is, he jumps right into his whole "And lo, I will mold you and make of you the most heavenly of singers, and the world will rejoice at your presence, and we can also maybe have sex" spiel. Bafflingly, Christine is all good with this and just sort of shrugs her shoulders and goes on singing for the mysterious peeping tom. A small attempt is made at passing it off as belief in her father's "Spirit of Music", but it feels tacked-on and barely relevant (and if you haven't read Leroux's novel and you didn't get the bizarrely obfuscated allusions to her father in the prologue, you're shit out of luck as far as having any idea what she's talking about goes.)

Then, to compound the weirdness, a shrewish-looking old woman in funereal clothes (seriously, do you remember the wicked stepmother in Disney's animated version of Cinderella? She looks like that, exactly.) arrives to pronounce that she always knew this would happen and it looks like "he" has chosen Christine and oh dear child we're so happy for you, and the audience is staring at the stage with the resounding silence of incomprehension. It turns out that the funereal woman is meant to be Madame Giry, though since all the characters apparently already know her, we never get introduced. Why is she harassing Christine in the middle of the night and why does she have any knowledge of the Phantom? Nobody knows. It's a mystery. It seems pretty clear that Rosen and Schierhorn borrowed heavily from Webber's stage version for her character, since she bears little resemblance to Leroux's frowsy boxkeeper; like Webber's version of the character, she's the teacher slash chaperone of the corps de ballet (having absorbed La Sorelli's role from Leroux's novel) and generally knows way more about the Phantom than anybody else does. Unlike Webber's version, however, no one ever explains why she knows these things, so we are left to make our assumptions as we can (I actually have a good one near the end of this review). She also teaches ballet in her Evil Governess costume, with a cane, because... that makes a lot of sense, sure.

The duet song, "Spirit of Music", is lovely, despite all these bewildering distractions. David Staller also has a beautiful voice, so despite the fact that I had little to no idea what was going on, I was able to coast along happily for a few minutes while they were singing. Ahhh. I liked the orchestration (when I could. There was a lot of synth abuse, but in smaller shows like this that can't be avoided, so I tried to be tolerant), particularly in this song; gentle violins and an extremely lullabye-like comforting sway made the song reminiscent of Christine's father, which was a good musical cue to have considering all the confusion surrounding said patriarch. I found it very interesting that they had chosen to go for "spirit" instead of "angel"; it's possible that this was mostly to avoid copyright conflicts with Webber's version, but I cherish a very tiny hope that someone involved in the creative process saw the 1987 animated film and borrowed that little quirk from it. Or, like said film, maybe they just wanted to avoid any religious overtones annoying potentially devout and/or atheistic audience members.

It should also be noted that the Phantom is wearing a white half mask, which is purely Webber's invention. Sure, it's easier to sing in onstage, but it's not a necessity--Charles Dance's mask from the 1990 film, for example, is perfectly apt for singing as well. Webber's was the very first Phantom to have a disfigurement on only half of his face, so there's very little argument that this is directly borrowed from that previous stage show.

Scene Two: Running the Show

Then there was another subtitle telling us that it was 10 years later, and I had a tantrum. Ten YEARS? From WHAT? If it's ten years from the Phantom taking over Christine's tutelage, that's very odd considering that she seems to be behaving as if he popped up last night. I think they meant to put this title earlier, and have Christine's dressing room visits be ten years after the ballet at the beginning, but... seriously. Why is the subtitle in the wrong place, chronologically? Was anyone still too unconfused and in need of being taken down a peg? And let's talk about why the show is now set in 1911. I assume this is because Leroux's novel was published in 1911, but... what? Why? Even if you're trying for some kind of historic accuracy, wouldn't you either use 1881 (the date from the actual story, cough) or at least 1910, when the story was actually written (it was written and published as a newspaper serial in 1910, and only released as a novel in 1911)? I don't understand the reasoning here. If anyone has a more in-depth understanding, hit me with it, because my brain is sore and would welcome collaboration. It seems like the barest bones of research was done here, and then everyone wandered off and wrote a play and felt very proud of themselves.

But, okay, sure, fine. We move on to the actual scene, which is rehearsal for the ballet chorus and stage-setting for the stagehands. The ballet music is appropriately sprightly and excitable, with bird-like string flutters and flutes. Madame Giry is here in her Widow Goes to Tea dress, directing the ballet girls with her cane in a scene that seems borrowed directly from Webber's musical. The Phantom is also present; he seems to enjoy panicking the ballet girls for no apparent reason; this version of the Phantom is extremely playful in that regard, as we'll see shortly with the managers. Of course, said playfulness also serves the dual purpose of reminding everyon in the opera house of his presence and power. The ballet girls sing an entertaining, chatty little gossip song in which they swap ghost stories about the Phantom; most of their descriptions seem to be those used in Leroux's novel, though they verge off into the ridiculous over time (and, of course, they're mostly inaccurate since the Phantom can only be so deformed in a stage performance). The instrumentation is choppy and shrill, which gets the feeling of agitation across nicely, but the chorus... the chorus hurts. They are offensive to the ear, which is probably not their fault so much as it is the fault of the poor sound acoustics for the video recording. Nevertheless, if you've decided on a format to release your show in and you stick with it, then you are fair game for criticism when it comes to that format. Eeeesh, they hurt.

There's also a small, somewhat timid gentleman prowling about, asking people nosy questions and generally being a very polite bother in his little brown hat. I could not figure out who he was supposed to be until much later. Turns out he's the Persian, who is in a stunning turn of events even more of a deus ex machina in this version than he was in Leroux's original. He's also much more confusing (granted, the Persian is supposed to be mysterious, but there's a line between mysterious and totally baffling that should not be crossed); like many other elements of the story, he isn't properly introduced until halfway through it, has only a very peripheral role to play, and then makes a meager attempt to justify his presence in the story at the end (which is not particularly successful). However, it's interesting to see him here at all--again, there are elements that show that the author-composers did indeed delve into Leroux some--since he has been conspicuously absent in most versions of the story. It's somewhat strange to have him here in juxtaposition with this very Webber-influenced Giry, since Webber's version of Giry fulfills many of the Persian's roles in lieu of his presence in that version; in light of this, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for Giry to know so damn much about the Phantom, but making sense appears to be a rare commodity in this show, and there may not have been enough of it to go around.

Carlotta arrives here as well, and I have to say that I do love her characterization in this piece. Most of the time, Carlotta is either a cardboard damsel in distress (as in the 1925 and 1943 films) or a cardboard antagonist provided to give Christine some adversity to overcome (as in the 1986 Webber musical or the 1990 television film), but she's given a little more depth in this version, which I appreciated. She's hardly a central character in Leroux's original novel, but I'm always in favor of a really clever re-envisioning of a character, and Carlotta is very well-done here. That said, when Carlotta is wufting about whining about how her famous high C might not be doing very well, I was unimpressed. The roles that Carlotta sings in Leroux's novel aren't exactly heavy dramatic roles, and I expected her to have a lighter, higher range; I know some fabulous mezzo-sopranos who have a nice C5, so it takes more than that to impress me. Add to that the fact that Carlotta busts out with the Queen of the Night's famous aria from Die Zauberfloete later on in the show, which goes a full fifth above that, and I was fairly convinced that Rosen and Schierhorn were just throwing out operatic-sounding things for her to say without paying much attention to the specifics.

Then the ballet chorus comes back to reprise their ear-bending little song, and I was sad. I think it's a clever little piece, and I'd love to hear it done by a really good chorus (or, at least, a chorus with better acoustics and recording equipment at their disposal).

Scene Three: Light & Darkness

Now, we digress into campy stage humor territory. Not that there's anything wrong with that, generally, but this is just so... mundane. I just praised Rosen & Schierhorn for their decision to give Carlotta a little more character; I also enjoy the fact that they've returned to Leroux's original characters somewhat for the managers, Moncharmin and Richard. While it's nice to see them have actual personalities, and to enjoy those personalities' reactions to the pranking and demands of the Phantom, it's somewhat disconcerting to watch them have this incredible divariffic spat in the middle of the show. There's the added difficulty, also, of the sound continuing to suck so that it's difficult to hear exactly what they're saying at times. It's still pretty fun to hear the ventriloquism of the original novel used convincingly in a stage setting; it's a hard thing to portray onstage, but the use of the two-way portrait is fairly ingenious, and I enjoyed the humor of the Phantom's shenanigans even while I acknowledged that it was all a wee bit trite. The Phantom really saves the scene for me, because I found most of the interaction between the managers unbelievable and tiring, and the wildly anachronistic language being used in the lyrics made my head hurt in context.

All of which is too bad, because the music is really pretty fun in a vaudeville sort of a way, and I wouldn't have had the slightest problem enjoying it in a different show, like a Mel Brooks production. But as a period piece, even jumped forward to 1911... no.

Scene Four: An Able Woman

The flip-flop that the staging pulls on us here is one of the few inventive things that I really enjoyed in this show. The audience is, effectively, put backstage, while the backdrop is painted to look like an audience; not only does this allow the actual audience to see what's going on backstage, which is generally more interesting that what you'd be seeing from the normal view, but it has a very cool mirroring effect on the audience as well, allowing them to feel that they are more involved in the show than an audience typically is (after all, THAT'S the audience, over there, right?).

Another thing that this stage show does that I appreciate is to use real opera arias, mostly those mentioned in Leroux's novel, rather than writing new ones (as in Webber's version) or re-lyricizing said operas (as in Hill's version). Now, granted, the arias have been translated into English to avoid total boredom on the part of a pretty much exclusively English-speaking audience, and I generally hate English-translated operas (the only one I ever saw that didn't seem utterly ridiculous was The Magic Flute in English, and, well... that one's supposed to be pretty ridiculous, so that's probably what saved it), but even so it was a well-thought-out and applied idea. Carlotta here is singing "The Jewel Song" from Gounod's Faust, which is one of the showpiece soprano arias of the time period and one which is used extensively in Leroux's novel. This Carlotta has an excellent voice, and even though she's intentionally letting a few of the seams show, I found myself getting just as annoyed as her audience by the constant interruptions to her singing.

Interestingly, the Phantom attempts to use the hapless Buquet (who, as he is in the 1989 film, is something of a drunk) to do his dirty work and sabotage Carlotta, which is quite a change from the solitary genius of Leroux's novel (and most other previous versions) who doesn't need anyone's help to get things accomplished. The attempt to use Buquet in this manner reminds me of the film henchmen (Ivan in the 1962 Fisher/Lom film and Lajos in the 1983 Markowitz/Schnell film) that were occasionally used in order to make the Phantom more sympathetic by keeping his hands free of blood, though there's no further evidence that either had a significant influence on this stage show. Buquet, who while he may be a drunk is still not as stupid as Christine, refuses and runs off screaming, which is the last straw for the beleaguered Carlotta.

So Christine gets dragged on to do her aria, and she's a hit (really, Walsh's voice is stunning), and Raoul sees and recognizes her and it's the usual instant return of childhood love for both of them. Confusingly, Christine and Raoul start to sing a duet, the exact purpose of which I still have yet to discover. At first, I assumed it was metaphorical--i.e., Raoul was singing to let us as the audience know his feelings and to show the reconnection between him and Christine. But then the Phantom seemed to be able to hear him and was making mopey faces on the other side of the stage, so then it seemed like he was literally singing, which made NO sense at all (the audience would be pissed off, not to mention the fact that one wouldn't expect the Vicomte to really have that much singing training). So then I thought, well, maybe the Phantom is just doing his pseudo-psychic thing; maybe he's overcome with emotion from Christine's performance, or maybe he can see Raoul's facial reaction even if there's no literal singing going on. Then, later, Raoul mentions that he stood up for all of Christine's performance, which I had assumed was part of the metaphorical conceit. So, to recap, he... stood up in the middle of the performance... and stood there the whole time... but didn't sing? Ooookay, then.

Then there's a horrible sound at the end of the song (after the fact, I hypothesize that it was meant to be some low-register sound from the synthesizer that wasn't rendered very well by the substandard speakers, but seriously, it was awful. I thought the theatre was being visited by the Awful Din) and Christine faints dramatically, a la her original debut in Leroux's book.

Carlotta finally sings the song "An Able Woman" here, but I'll forgive its tardiness because it's so wonderful. Not only is Beth McVey's voice gorgeous, but the song itself, which is Carlotta's lament that she's being pushed aside for a younger, prettier model despite the fact that she still has the talent, experience and pipes to keep on singing, is a tear-jerker. Far from being a cipher as she is in the original novel or a spiteful witch as she is in many interpretations, this Carlotta is a sympathetic character, one who knows that her career will soon be drawing to a close and that she will have to deal with the harsh reality of being forgotten in favor of a new face. When, at the close of her song, she tearfully declares, "I may be succeeded, but I will never be replaced!", we feel for her plight and forgive her abrasive behavior, since we are now privy to her insecurities and the knowledge of her eventual professional doom (and, if we happen to already know the Phantom story, there's the added dimension of being aware that her career will be winding to a close sooner rather than later). This unexpected sympathy for Carlotta also has the added effect of making the Phantom more demonic because of his persecution of her, which is a nice touch.

Scene Five: Perfect Music, Perfect Love

Madame Giry returns to nursemaid Christine when she wakes up from her faint, and none of our questions are answered when Christine explains to Raoul that Giry is "a very dear friend". Okay, if you say so. It is interesting that Giry takes on the mother role in this version for Christine (it should be noted that Meg is totally absent from this production, though there's some speculation that the ballerina at the very end may be intended to be her); the original Giry was the only mother figure in Leroux's novel, but the other characters were left motherless by design there. It's Webber's version of Madame Giry that becomes a de facto mother to the entire opera house (or at least to Christine and the ballet corps), and, as most other evidence indicates, this too suggests that this is basically a direct import of Webber's vision of Madame Giry. Her attempts to stonewall Raoul from seeing Christine, however, do give her a little bit of that original boxkeeper role, if we assume that Christine can be equated with the Phantom's box (as Giry considers her his property).

The Daroga is confusingly characterized, being both much more sociable and active than the inscrutable character of Leroux's novel, and also much less of a commanding, intelligent presence, being more of a beetling, timid little dude most of the time. He doesn't really seem to have much to recommend him as a police officer, honestly, though he'd make a fabulous Watson to some enterprising Holmes.

The Phantom does his first kidnapping thing, and Christine is all wtf and it's about as you'd expect, until the Phantom gets to his little monologue about himself (he's quite ego-centric). This particular Phantom has a very singular purpose, and that is to be a representation of passion. While Leroux's Erik certainly represents that, this Phantom is Passion and nothing else (he doesn't, for example, represent much in the way of sexuality, fatherhood, change, growth, or the unfairly-censured lower echelons of society). It's made clear several times over the course of the show (all of his vocal teaching with Christine is based exclusively upon getting her to put more passion into her delivery, not upon vocal technique at all, etc.) that passion, and the fostering of that passion, is the Phantom's greatest love and goal. His exhortations to Christine here make that blatantly obvious, almost to the point of "okay, I get it, thank you, go on, please", but it does pose the interesting question: if the Phantom represents unbridled artistic passion, will that turn out to be his redeeming quality or his downfall? Certainly he's a much, much happier guy in this version than in most, including Leroux's original, because he has this motivating passion to sustain him (doesn't leave much time to angst over how no one loves him).

The title song for this scene, "Perfect Music, Perfect Love", is the Phantom's big number and without a doubt the most impressive song of the entire score. There's plenty of irony here, most notably in the Phantom's assertions that the world above is insane and ugly, which highlight the fact that he seems to be deluding himself into believing that he lives alone by choice (in order to avoid the ignorant, passionless, artistically inept plebes, no doubt). The song has an arresting melody and a memorable scheme, with appropriate instrumentation where necessary--flutes and violins when the Phantom's pleading for Christine's love, sudden shift to drums and agitated synth noises when he becomes agitated, etc.--and Staller's voice is expressive and dramatic. The choreography is just this side of side-splittingly hilarious, but I can't really blame the performer for that. The lyrics of the song, as you can see even from the title, equate music and musical perfection to love; it's an interesting dilution, since Leroux's novel equated music with sexuality (i.e., the act of creation). I suppose "Perfect Music, Perfect Sex" would have had a much smaller target demographic (though many lyrics in here, such as "I'll always be your fulfillment", seem to be sexually oriented anyway).

I got very excited when I heard the following lyrical line: "I saw your skull through the mirror, and I saw that we're the same." I wrote this long, involved paragraph about how the horror of the Phantom's face comes from our horror of mortality and the realization that we, too, are prey to it, but then about halfway through the remaining song time I realized that he'd said "soul", not "skull". Alas. My hopes were dashed. Back to the passion metaphor.

Limited as it is, Staller is nevertheless incredible in this role. I believe in his version of the character even with the ridiculous choreography and the stilted lines and the general unremarkableness that permeates this show. In particular, he does an excellent job of flipping back and forth between the rants of a mad genius and the supplication of a desperate lover, giving the character a lot of depth that frankly isn't written into his role very well. All of that said, however, a lot of this scene annoyed me. The Phantom's declaration that he would go to the masked ball with Christine made me think of a prom date, and he did way, way too much explaining to Christine about his deformity; this Phantom is extremely extroverted in order to serve as a convincing representation of Passion, but that very extroverted behavior is confusing and galling in light of his many pains to remain undiscovered and his generally secretive lifestyle up to this point.

And, by the way, if I can talk about said lifestyle... what is it, exactly? Because his underground bachelor pad is set up like he's been there forever, and his dialogue bears this out, but while the corps de ballet gossips about him, he clearly hasn't been involved in the opera house to date at all; the managers are quite surprised to find that he's suddenly demanding money and show substitutions, and Madame Giry's lines seem to indicate that he hasn't bothered anyone in a very long time. The original Phantom story had catalysts to spur all this action; the managers were replaced and the tendency of the new managers toward being difficult, combined with the sudden need to foster Christine's career and love, were the factors that led most directly to all the opera house debacles and the Phantom's eventual downfall. Everything just sort of suddenly happens in this version, with no apparent spur, and that's very bothersome to me. I want to know why, dammit. Good writers of anything, be it a novel, play, or film, should make sure their audience isn't crying from lack of explicated whys.

The Phantom's new role as representative of passion, and the changed dynamic that brings to his relationship with Christine (i.e., that he is concerned mostly with her indulging her passions, especially her musical passions, rather than with trying to get her to love him and thus save him from his solitary estrangement from mankind), gives rise to a very different reaction to her inevitable unmasking of him. He's not particularly incensed or insane; rather, he is disappointed in Christine for having so small a breadth of mind, for turning out to be "just like all the others". By the way, I love the Phantom's disfigurement in this version; despite being very Webber-inspired in its half-face size, it's very deathly and hideous.

Then we head off to the masked ball--mostly set to Saint-Saens' timeless Danse Macabre--where I spend some time trying to figure out what the hell the Phantom's mask is supposed to be (is it a dragon? is it a demon? is it a bear? someone, help me!) and everybody picks on Carlotta some more. The Phantom offers Carlotta a drink with a poisoned element so that her singing is affected, a move that was used by Carlotta herself in the 1990 Richardson/Dance film. It causes her to have vocal problems that manifest as a sudden, abrupt descent into a male vocal register without warning as she's singing. Of course, this is totally physically impossible, even without the precision with which she's still hitting the notes in their new octaves; it's pandering to the crowd for comedic effect, and it is fairly humorous to hear parts of the Queen of the Night's aria suddenly popping in and out of the soprano register. Personally, I would have preferred that Rosen & Schierhorn had used the Phantom's ventriloquism from the original novel, since that's literally what's going on (Staller is singing the lower registers for McVey, making it a duet). The Phantom's passionate sexuality is present here in that Carlotta crushes on him a bit, and he catches her in a very steamy-looking embrace when she faints.

Buquet also turns up dead here, with an axe sticking out of his back, causing me to recall the deeply subtle axe combat from Phantom of the Mall and get all snickery (more likely, this is actually borrowed from the 1983 Markowitz/Schnell film again, in which the Phantom offs the traitorous claqueuer with an axe--not exactly a subtle moment in that film, either).

Scene Six: Something Out There

Raoul and Christine flee to the roof for their little heart to heart, and Raoul makes his role from the novel blindingly obvious with various statements. He actually says outright that he will love her without demands, unlike her audience (and, of course, the Phantom), even if she decides never to give him her regard in return. It's clear that Rosen & Schierhorn certainly understood Raoul's appeal in Leroux's novel and passed it on here, giving him such telling lines as, "I would never ask for anything from you... but [your love] would be a gift from Heaven itself." He's very much the gentle, sexless Gothic love interest here, representing safety and love without obligations or frightening sexuality. In fact, we're practically beaten over the head with it--he actually uses the fact that others will demand things from her as a negative in order to recommend himself in their little love duet.

Christine digresses into her own separate little song about how much she loves the Phantom and how strong his hold over her is, which is both confusing (when did she have time to get so attached? Personally, with only the experiences here to go on, I'd be petrified) and somewhat hilarious since Raoul goes right on smiling and declaring his endless love and devotion to her without a hint of jealousy. That's an odd choice here, that Raoul is never in the slightest bit jealous of Christine, and an obvious change from the original novel; this Raoul is not intended to show elements of immaturity or childishness because those aren't particularly sympathetic to a modern audience looking for a suave, debonair hero, so they are omitted. On the flip side of the coin, I don't understand why the Phantom, who is listening in, is reaching such heights of crankiness himself--she's stomping all over Raoul to talk about how much she cares about the Phantom, and all said masked psychopath can do is get upset over it. Men.

Then, in a sudden and bizarre twist, the Phantom abducts Christine right off the roof and absconds below with her, leaving Raoul to scuttle about and cobble together a rescue attempt as he can. It's interesting that there is no chandelier drop in this version; I'd draw a parallel from the 1989 Little/Englund film, which also omitted the chandelier, but in this case I think it's just a matter of the smaller production not being able to handle a dramatic chandelier falling from the sky (Hill's adaptation had a similar problem, but they solved it quite gracefully, rather than simply ignoring it as is done here).

Then, poof! Sudden cut to the Persian intercepting Raoul and their pursuit of the Phantom! Somehow the Persian knows a lot of things, even though earlier he didn't. The pacing is ridiculously breakneck in this last part of the act. I almost got whiplash. This scene with the two of them lasts, oh... five nanoseconds. Then back to the Phantom and Christine. The most interesting part of this final scene between them, for me, was the Phantom's obvious ability to equate Christine with heavenly redemption but his inability to fully grasp that as a concept that he should be aspiring to. His abrupt leap from begging her to stay to begging her to take him with her show an almost childish confusion: he's aware that he wants and needs her, but he isn't entirely certain why.

The final showdown between Raoul and the Phantom isn't much of a showdown; it's pretty much just the Phantom snootily informing Raoul that Christine can leave any time she feels like it, and then his being astonished when she chooses the Vicomte over him. It makes the Phantom a much more sympathetic character that he allows her simply to not choose him--no force is involved whatsoever, and only minimal begging. This does, however, weaken his character and reduce the scene to a somewhat less interesting level than it might otherwise have attained. The best lines come after Raoul and Christine depart, when the Phantom remarks derisively to the Persian that the upper world "is terrified of genuine passion." The Persian, after busting out a little sword and making me laugh hysterically (remember the Persian's swordfight from Bischoff's 1976 book? Hilarious!), vows to catch the Phantom one day, while his opposite number vows never to be caught and they take off in separate directions, leaving us with the intentionally ambiguous ending for the Phantom. One of his final lines is the most spot-on encapsulation of what the entire show has been trying to get across: "True passion must, by its nature, lead to true insanity." It's only one of the plethora of themes in Leroux's work, but it's the main point of this spin-off.

Scene Seven: Back Into the Darkness

There's a wee little scene between Raoul and Christine, mostly reaffirming their love and giving us a good idea of their steady, orderly kind of love. We're pretty bored, since with the Phantom's departure there is no longer any conflict. Mercifully, this part is short.

Then, finally, a lone ballerina is at practice when a strange voice starts to hound her and give her dancing tips. Yes, this is what you think it is: Phantom Stalking, round two (Christine didn't work out. Let's try that again). This final scene sets him up as a sort of eternal, insane muse, representative of excess, uncontrolled passion. Redemption? Ha ha. No, none for you. His final line, "I am whatever you want me to be!", accompanied by maniacal laughter to the sky, makes it clear that he's being used in a representational context, not a literal one.

It also gives me my Giry theory--maybe Madame Giry knows all this stuff because she's Christine Mk. I, the Phantom's previous effort! Yeah, it's thin. But it's all I've got to hope for as far as the mysterious Madame is concerned. Something in this show needs to give me hope.

I want to stress that the music in this show isn't bad. Not at all. It just isn't impressively good, either, and while I could probably put the soundtrack on (if they had released a soundtrack, that is) and listen to it in perfect contentment for quite a while, it would never be the first thing I reached for.

We should also note that, like Webber's Phantom, this version of the famous masked man is never named. While it's quite true that this enhances his role as the living personification of the concept of passion (after all, that doesn't really need anything as earthly and limiting as a name attached to it), it still betrays quite a lot of influence from Webber's version, which seems above all to have been the most borrowed from for this stage adaptation (ironic, since it continually insists that it's more challenging and faithful to Leroux's novel than the Webber version).

The bottom line is that while nothing is heart-rendingly bad here, nothing is very good, either, and a lot of it is on the shady, icky side of mediocrity. The strength of the performers is pretty much the only thing that keeps this show from descending into D territory.

(Cross-posted to The Phantom Project.)

A few more vignettes for Spring

Fri, 09 May 2008 01:52:37 GMT

Some things have occurred recently.

First, my internet and television suddenly disappeared for two days, because the landlord forgot to pay the cable bill. There was much sadness, and many a cry of, "Nooo! My review draft is saved in an online location!" Then there was crying, and beer. All is now resolved.

Secondly, we bought a little halter lead for our kittens, because they're always wanting to go outside. Actually, only one of them wants to go outside; the other is terrified and will only go outside if "mommy" carries her and she can frequently stick her head under my chin and pretend, ostrich-like, that she's in a safe dark hole. We put the other one in the leash and had some fun learning that you cannot walk a kitten, and also that no matter how excited said kitten is to be outside, the second a stroller goes rumbling by there will be instant panic and clawing.

Thirdly, AJ finally posted The Milkumentary, which is the documentary made from the college institution that he, John, and their friends started: the Dairy Challenge. Do not watch this if you have a delicate stomach. There is a lot of vomit involved. It is, however, extremely funny, and anyone who hasn't and is interested in seeing what John looks like can do so (he's the big Italian brute in the glasses, impersonating a dairy store manager). Also features cameo appearances by Tom! (There are no cameo appearances of me, since I was a conscientious objector to the event. I did, however, have the joy of washing some very unfortunate clothing afterward.)

Fourthly, there is a really creepy old lady on our street. She lives in the attic of one of the houses on our block and never comes down, but every time we walk down the street she opens the curtains and stares at us. Sometimes she drags a dog's squeaky toy repeatedly down the screen, making a strangled squeaking sound, until we get out of her range. It's frankly terrifying.

Fifthly, I'm finally off of Death's doorstep, but I probably have mono (thanks, mono-carrying loser boyfriend), so I may be delightfully listless and/or periodically ill for a while. And I just used up my last sick day! Hooray.

Sixthly, there's a little Mexican convenience mart about five blocks away that sells Pepsi-cola in the old-school glass bottles. It tastes just as good as you remember it tasting. John and I went down and bought several bottles and a pizza tonight. We's havin us a party.

Seventhly (that doesn't even sound like a word), I am so beyond words excited that the board shenanigans with risen_one, johnnydeath and mebemojo have resumed. John is even still putting in his star celebrity cameos. It really keeps my writing mojo going, and is too much fun besides. Oh, the overweening angst! Giggle. Snort.

Eighthly (that doesn't sound like a word, either; maybe there is a numerical limit on adverbing integers), our kittens are the worst guard cats ever. Not only did they not kill the ants they found sneaking in via a crack in the wall, but they helped spread them around the room by playing with them all the way into the kitchen and then getting bored and wandering off. On the other hand, they were determined beyond all reason to off the one lone moth that wandered in the open window, so much so that when it hid somewhere for a few hours they meowed ceaselessly at the ceiling in distress over not being able to find it.

Ninthly, I have a review to finish and a boy begging me to watch 300 with him, so it's off to funland for me!

PORN. (Well, not really.)

Mon, 05 May 2008 20:03:34 GMT

First of all, I have to say that infected lymph nodes are one of the most uncomfortable, awful things that can happen to you on a Friday night. I'm still out sick, because they're trying to drill through the right side of my neck and escape. Personally, I'd rather be back at work than sitting here in misery, but John keeps saying things like "lymphoma" and "infections" and "immune system" and pushing me back into bed.

Speaking of John, we had a not-quite-an-argument, more of a scholarly-discussion-with-loud-disagreements, the other night. Basically, I was going through my list of materials, and I remarked in an offhand that the next one I had chronologically was one of those "adult" versions. And whoosh, like a volcano erupting, there came heated discussion.

Basically, John thinks I should omit the adult versions, while I think I should include them. We both had good arguments: John said that pornographic versions of the story were hardly mainstream or relevant, while I said that they were probably just as widely viewed as any of the traditional versions of the story. John said that including adult films with no guarantee of a literary basis would damage my academic credibility; I said that NOT including them out of a misguided sense of propriety would damage my academic credibility. He said that the vast majority of adult films barely have plots at all, and that it wouldn't be worthwhile for me to sit through them all when they were likely to follow no particular patterns; I said that I wouldn't know that unless I analyzed them, and that even if they were pretty plot-less, I would need to include the reasons behind that in my final analysis (since I'm supposed to be looking at the ways stories are changed in modern contexts, and the cultural reasons behind those changes). He said that nobody could possibly respect a literary paper that included adult films in its sources, and that it would bar my findings and website from enjoying as large a circulation as they otherwise might; I said that I wasn't going to be writing anything x-rated in the project, and that I didn't see why it couldn't be taken seriously in a scholarly context. He said I was a stubborn wench. I said he was pig-headed. And so on, and so forth.

So, in all seriousness, who out there has an opinion? Hit me with it. I obviously have my own, but I need more input here, and you guys have proven to have leveler heads than me some days (and those are days that I'm not sick as a dog and doped up like there's no tomorrow). Is this something that should be included in the main body of work? In a sub-section (which is my vote)? Or left out entirely?

The Phantom Project: The Phantom of the Opera, directed by Tony Richardson

Mon, 05 May 2008 19:38:40 GMT

Wow. This version is different. Really, really different.

The Phantom of the Opera, directed by Tony Richardson, 1990
Starring Charles Dance, Teri Polo, and Adam Storke
Grade: C+

My relationship with this film was off to a rocky start quite literally out of the box. I'm trying to do my best to penny-pinch in this project, since there's so very much material to find/buy/cover, so in this particular case I had bought the Korean import DVD because it was less expensive. Of course, this means I can't read anything on the cover, but that's what IMDB is for, right? The cover certainly has the looming visage of Charles Dance on it, but when I opened it up to put it in the player, imagine my consternation to discover that the inside insert and disc art were actually those of the Darwin Knight musical DVD. Whoa, back that train up. I was very upset, especially since I already shelled out for the Knight musical and I didn't need two copies. With a heavy, sinking heart, I put it in the player to make sure, and what should greet me at the menu screen but the logos for the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical version of Phantom. Whaaaat? And then, after all that misdirection and confusion, it turned out that the film on the disc really was the Richardson/Dance movie after all.

Those wacky Koreans. Like I don't manage to confuse myself enough most days without their help.

First of all, the sets for this piece are absolutely gorgeous, primarily because they aren't sets at all; this is the first film I've watched that was shot almost entirely on location at the Paris opera house, the Palais Garnier (there are a few exceptions, most notably the Phantom's underground lagoon and the boxes in the audience, but 99% of the filming is the opera house itself). The wide shots, particularly those of the house from the stage, are stunning, and the gorgeous statuary and architecture are showcased well, especially during the credits. Unsurprisingly, special attention is paid to filming the mask-like faces that line the tops of some eaves, and the broken angel statues that march along some walls.

It should be noted that this is a very different version of the Phantom story, plotwise, than pretty much all other retreads. It is based on a musical by Arthur Kopit and Maury Yeston (which I'll be covering fairly soon), which had been written at almost the exact same time as Webber's. Seeing as Webber's was becoming a sensation, the Kopit/Yeston musical was shelved until it was realized that it was different enough in plot and direction to be a stand-alone piece, and this film was subsequently adapted from it. Be warned: it's not going to be entirely the story that most of us know.

All of the characters are basically, fundamentally changed, beginning with Christine. She is a sweet, innocent country waif, who after a chance encounter with the Count de Changy (mixing of English and French terminology, I know, but they probably felt "count" was easier for English-speaking audiences to grasp) is sent to the Paris opera house to ask for singing lessons. The background plays up her innocence and the fact that she is uncomfortable in the alien, worldly atmosphere of the opera house, but also robs her of a lot of her initial strength, as she has no musical background beyond her father's playing and is highly timid and frightened by the prospect of performing. Unlike the Christine of Leroux's novel, this woman does not change too much over the course of the film; she experiences little spiritual growth, seeing as she has already begun at what is basically a pinnacle of innocence and tolerant perfection (even more so than the original character did). This will become a recurring problem for more than just Christine as the film wears on.

Raoul--or rather, not Raoul, bear with me for a moment--is also a very different character. We hear about him long before we ever meet him, and it's a little bit concerting to discover that he's apparently something of a rake, tomcatting around with any number of girls and apparently having made the rounds through every chorus girl at the opera house (in short, when combined with his eventual "redemption" at Christine's hands, he's a traditional romance novel hero). This is obviously a huge change from Leroux's original conception of the character; Raoul, as the representation of childhood innocence and safe, comforting love, was almost entirely non-sexual in order to foster that feeling of security. Additionally, he's not Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagny anymore; this version has him as Philippe, the Count de Chagny, which is confusing since Philippe was Raoul's older brother in Leroux's novel. I can't quite come up with a justification for that change, unless it's that Philippe's character in the novel was much closer to the character set up here than Raoul's was (Philippe wasn't exactly a roving wench-bedder, but he did have a confirmed mistress in La Sorelli and a fairly typical derisive opinion of opera ladies in general). But why make it a love story between Philippe and Christine instead of Raoul and Christine? I think we have to assume that the character is intended to BE Raoul (and he will become more Raoul-like later on in the story), but is NAMED Philippe for some bizarre reason. Seriously, I have no idea why and it confusticates and bebothers me.

So, anyway, Philippe and his multiple personality disorder aside, we have a slight change in the opera house's general running scheme. In this case, the former manager, Carriere, has been fired after thirty years of service by the new owner, Cholet, who is taking over the managing himself. Carlotta is in this version his wife, and appears to be of indeterminate ethnicity (though her husband has a rather outrageous Italian accent), though she does have the same red hair that was so popularized in previous film and stage versions. Carlotta is also the reigning soprano, and the added dimension of nepotism that is added to her status as the manager's wife is a plausible explanation for the favoritism shown toward her. Unlike most later versions of Carlotta, she doesn't have the best voice; she certainly has quite a lot of technique and a powerful instrument, but the singer (as usual, I'm not sure who it is--it seems pretty certain that it's not Andrea Ferreol, the actress, but the singers are all credited as "singer" only, so I don't know who is who) is intentionally flubbing and over-dramatizing in order to convey a certain lack of true talent. I suspect that the singer is perfectly capable of sounding bang-up excellent. Even though her voice still doesn't sound nearly bad enough to me to be classified as "not being able to sing", the singer still does a great job of managing to sound like she's passable but not in the same league as Christine, which is a hard balance to strike (but essential for the believability of the piece).

Buquet gets a character face-lift in this as well, being here upgraded from stagehand to Carlotta's personal costumer (a post Christine will take over later in the film). Like all version of Buquet, he is tragically short-lived, though through no fault of his own; counter to the original Buquet's fate being a response to his loose lips regarding the Phantom's doings, this one is bullied by Carlotta into descending into the Phantom's domain to take inventory of the props and is summarily killed for trespassing. Interestingly, Buquet is not hung as he is in most versions, but is so terrified by the Phantom's appearance that he topples off a catwalk to his death; this violence-free method absolves the Phantom of any real blame for Buquet's demise, which will become important later since this particular Phantom, like the title character in the 1962 film, is a tragic hero rather than an object of terror.

The Phantom certainly is meant to be a sympathetic and heroic figure here, but Richardson nevertheless does an amazing job at the beginning of playing him up as a ghostly, supernatural figure. Prior to actually encountering Erik, the opera house is convincingly and entertainingly haunted; statues rotate to follow Cholet with their empty eyes, while paintings and busts fall off the walls unprovoked as if affected by a poltergeist. The Phantom's ghostly voice also whispers in peoples' ears, which has an extremely ghostly and telepathic effect (the fact that this is never explained actually adds quite a bit to the overall feel of things; a viewer who has read Leroux's novel and understands that this is accomplished via telepathy can enjoy the faithfulness to the source material just as much as a viewer who hasn't can enjoy the "supernatural" abilities of the Phantom). Carriere plays the idea of the ghost up to Cholet, telling him about the old Communard torture chambers beneath the opera house (popular rumor, though there were definitely storage areas and prisons down there during the siege of Paris) and generally trying to scare the shit out of him. It's seriously quite spooky; I wouldn't want to be in an opera house in which things flew around without being touched. Cholet, who is overblown but not entirely stupid, assumes that Carriere is playing an unkind trick on him, and this turns out to be truer than one would generally suspect.

Our first moment of thunderstruck confusion comes when Carriere calls out to Erik by name. As an audience, this is confusing because we've just heard all about how creepy and ghostly he is, and poltergeisty ghosts generally aren't called by name. Furthermore, it's confusing from a perspective of analyzing the changes in the story, because the only characters to learn Erik's name in the original novel were the Persian and Christine (and Raoul by extension). Leroux's original version of Erik wasn't, as a rule, very sociable. Better yet, however, we soon discover that he's actually an accomplice of sorts with the Phantom, when he turns up having a conversation--nay, an argument--in the Phantom's underground. Carriere, with his knowledge of Erik's origin and movements, fulfills the role of the Persian from Leroux's original novel, the most notable difference being that he is present from beginning to end (much like Webber's version of Madame Giry, in fact, who is also a substitute for the Persian).

Despite all the supernatural clap-trap that was set up for us at the beginning, Dance's Phantom is a very human figure. There is absolutely no doubt that he is a wholly mortal man: he has a plausible (albeit unusual) human backstory, totally human motivations and needs, and a penchant for arguing with Carriere as though they were equals, something that has not been seen in previous versions (all of which have conceived of the Phantom as something set slightly higher than a normal man, either because of a supernatural component or because of his genius). While Carriere earlier drove home the idea of the undergrounds of the opera house as the Phantom's "domain", an inviolate kingdom with only one authority, this idea (which is directly pulled from Leroux's original novel) is damaged by the fact that Erik and Carriere argue so readily, and destroyed by the fact that Carriere actually manages to wield some influence over Erik, convincing him of a course of action, making him apologize, and keeping his own secrets from the underground lurker, again something that has not been done in previous versions (as it weakens Erik's character and makes him merely a fugitive in the cellars, rather than the ruler of a separate demesne.) The facts that the Erik not only appeals to Carriere for help in deciding how to deal with his problems, but actually apologizes to him for his ghoulish sense of humor, give the Phantom a very unprecedented sense of subordination; he seems to react almost like a chastened child, which is something that definitely has never been visited in any version of the adult Erik. This Phantom is also very logical and gentlemanly, and shows strong evidence of having a conscience, all of which are at odds with the original conception as a half-insane genius with an almost sociopathic heedlessness of others; the change robs the character of much of his mystique and power, but also makes him much more relatable and sympathetic for the audience (i.e., he is a man, not a potential monster).

There's quite a bit of humor in this version of the story, mostly expressed through the occasionally quirky quips of Erik and Carriere (for example, Erik jokes about his condemnation to the cellars, treating it as a subject for humor rather than a vehicle for angst). While most versions tend to approach the story as a very dramatic animal, whether in a romantic or a horrific vein, this one has an element of fun that, while subtle and infrequent, is nonetheless interesting. Kopit has stated that his musical upon which this was based was being written at the same time that Hill's musical production, which abounds with tongue-in-cheek humor, was playing in London, so it's not too much of a stretch to theorize that he may have borrowed a leaf from Hill's playbook.

I was a little bit confused when Erik asked Carriere who the Count de Chagny was, however. Even living in the cellars, you'd think he'd have a general idea who the count was, considering that he happens to be both an extremely important contributing patron of the opera and, well, aristocracy. This question was later put into even more suspicious light when Erik talks to Christine about Philippe's behavior at the opera house in previous years; there may have been intended to be some kind of mind-games going on here between either Erik and Carriere or Erik and Christine, but I'm at a loss as to what it is. It seems more like a scripting error (well, not an error, but a slightly transparent bid to bring Philippe into the conversation).

There's an old gentleman named Jean-Claude, whose exact function I couldn't quite pin down but who seems to be sort of a doorman-cum-groundskeeper-cum-bellhop-cum-assistant to everyone in the building. He takes over the role that was filled by Madame Giry in Leroux's original novel, warning others of the Phantom's reality and mischief and cheerfully stymieing the machinations of the new managers whenever he feels they are overstepping their bounds. Entertainingly enough, the actual Mrs. Giry as boxkeeper does appear in one scene in which she has no lines and is bullied into opening the box for other patrons, but she never returns and is not named.

Christine's introduction into the world of the opera house is a bit too easy and pat for me: she is taken on as Carlotta's costuming assistant after Buquet has conveniently kicked the buquet (oh, man, I slay me!) and Carlotta has been reminded that Philippe's patronage is not to be trifled with, and then Jean-Claude lets her go ahead and live beneath the opera house out of the goodness of his heart, despite the fact that this is strictly forbidden and he has no assurances that she won't simply steal everything she sees and take off. This was all a bit too much of a stretch for me, and while, again, I hesitate to attribute anything here to borrowing from the Webber musical (which was supposedly written in almost parallel time to this piece), it's hard to ignore the fact that that's the only previous version of the story that has hinted that Christine actually lived at the opera house, as opposed to in a house or garret somewhere in Paris (with Mama Valerius! Anyone remember her? No? ...well, okay then). Especially since Christine is being presented to us here as a completely ignorant peasant girl from out in the boonies, the lack of class friction (from everyone except for Carlotta, but that seems less a desire for realism and more a desire to portray Carlotta as a bitch) is confusing. Pretty much the only antipathy Christine encounters is from the other opera girls, who are jealous of the attention Philippe lavishes on her, and from Carlotta, who is generally a pain in everyone's collective ass.

Richardson has a lot of fun over the course of the film with the Phantom's mask; specifically, he loves tricking us by making us think that we're about to have a surprise unmasking of the deformity sprung upon us without warning. More than once, the Phantom reaches up and whips off his mask, and a second later everyone lets out their breath when they realize that he's actually wearing a second mask underneath that one. When he does actually unmask entirely (or we see flashbacks in which he is not masked), the camera adroitly avoids giving us a clear shot of his face, always lingering on the back of his head or ending up maddeningly blocked by a piece of scenery or another character. While I thought this was fun and clever the first couple of times, by about three quarters of the way through the film I had become anxious about it; the repeated rush of adrenaline followed by disappointed curiosity was building up to such a pitch that I started to seriously worry about the deformity makeup. The buildup was so severe that I was worried that the deformity wouldn't be able to back it up and would be a letdown.

Again, due to the confusion surrounding the poorly-credited singers, I can't really figure out if Teri Polo is actually singing the part of Christine or not (I found no evidence of her ever doing any other musical performances, but that doesn't necessarily mean she wouldn't be able to). If she isn't singing it, however, she certainly does the best damn job of lip-syncing that I've seen in any film version yet; she breathes convincingly in all the right places and there's never any disconnect between the soundtrack and what her mouth is doing. Whether it's Teri Polo singing or not, the voice is certainly quite pretty; the singer doesn't do a particularly good job of sounding totally untrained at the beginning (nobody sings like that without training), but there is definitely a marked improvement after she accepts the Phantom's tutelage.

As the film wore on (all two and a half hours of it, which was really more like four because I kept pausing and writing notes... stupid miniseries length), I found myself wishing that more use had been made of enhancing background music. There are extremely long periods of silence in the film, and while silence can be a very effective tool in storytelling, particularly in suspense and emotional moments, it seemed overdone here to the point of losing much of its efficacy. I wanted more audible clues or subtle influences on the audience, and they seemed absent for much of the film. Pacing also drags somewhat--not in every scene, but in several, most notably the scene in which the Phantom confronts Christine on the stage and offers his services as a teacher, things seem to drag on for just a hair longer than necessary, causing me to lose interest.

Various small questions plagued me throughout the first opera rehearsals: for example, why the Phantom insists on wearing a funky, shiny silver mask for some reason (not feeling dashing enough in your boring skin-colored mask, Erik? Playing dress-up?), and whether or not the copious public displays of affection between Cholet and Carlotta were anachronistic. I got all excited when it appeared that Christine might be developing a wee little crush on the actor playing Mephisto, but then it was dropped and never revisited, much to my disappointment.

When Richardson does remember to make use of his background score, however, it is generally to good effect. The ominous foreshadowing, in particular, is appreciably subtle; light strings and flutes give it a very nervous air, and are more fitting for a less brutal, more non-traditional Phantom.

In a huge change from Leroux's original Phantom, Dance's version of the character walks right up to Christine and introduces himself, offering to tutor her voice. Not only does this completely excise the "Angel of Music" deception that is originally so central to Christine's relationship with Erik, but it also establishes two very important characteristics for the Phantom himself: 1) that this version is apparently much more comfortable with interacting directly with people than Leroux's original, who allowed conversation only extremely rarely and with certain select parties, and 2) that he is a supplicant asking for Christine's permission to teach, not a powerful authority figure as in the original novel. This works well in context, as part of Richardson's continuing crusade to humanize the living hell out of the Phantom (literally! Hee, I'm so funny!), though there is an unfortunate undertone (at least, to me) of sexual bartering which is not pursued past this scene. Erik clearly wants Christine, but he's very gentlemanly about never asking her for anything; again, extremely humanized. Amusingly, he allows Christine to believe that he wears the mask in order to conceal his identity, rather than admitting to his deformity; the lie (or, at least, the omission of truth) suggests a Phantom who is desperate to conceal his true nature from Christine, at odds with the original Erik's desire to be "loved for himself".

Carlotta's debut in Bellini's Norma is actually, again, not half bad; the heavy role suits her equally heavy voice, and I found myself wondering what everyone was making such a fuss over when they said she couldn't sing. Certainly her acting and presentation were dramatically overblown, but vocally I couldn't find that much to complain about (things could have been better, of course, but the singer is certainly no slouch, even with the scooping and sliding that she was doing to make things sound more ridiculous). I would have liked a more plausible "suck factor", since the excuse of nepotism is a nice, ready-made excuse for a bad singer to be center stage in this large a venue. Her lip-syncing was slightly off, but not so noticeably that I was irked by it for more than a second or so. The tricks the Phantom plays on Carlotta to damage her performances are relatively minor and petty--seeding her wigs with lice and fleas, gluing her props together, etc.--and reinforce his image as an essentially okay guy who, while he might harass her out of offended sensibilities, will not actually hurt her any.

In a move that pays direct homage to the Julian/Chaney film, the chief police inspector that Cholet spends most of his time harassing for results is named Ledoux, the same name as the Secret Police officer who replaced the Persian in the 1925 movie. Ledoux isn't in the Persian's role this time, since Carriere has taken that over, but it's fun to see that little reference thrown in there.

The big conflict between Christine's feelings for Philippe and her feelings for Erik is pretty succinctly summed up by the Phantom himself during their lessons; he says that Philippe comes to the opera for the women and the social status, rather than for the love of the music itself. Music is paramount for Erik in terms of emotion, and the line here is clearly drawn for Christine, between the pleasures of a social, enjoyable love with Philippe or a withdrawn, but artistic and passionate, love with Erik. This Christine is by far the most conflicted between these choices of any previous film version, due in large part to the fact that Erik is made such a sympathetic character that her choice is effectively between a society man who loves her and another a reclusive man who loves her, instead of between a society man who loves her and a psychotic, violent killer who loves her.

The discovery of Buquet's body, which Erik plants in order to scare the pants off of Cholet and encourage him to stop being so uncooperative, is high camp at its most entertaining. Cholet actually screams like girl and backs into a wall, remaining there like a quivery, whimpering mannequin until the inspector rushes in (only to find the body gone, of course). It's all very silly, of course, but it also helps give the Phantom that extra supernatural enhancement again, as even we in the audience are hard-pressed to figure out how he managed to disappear the corpse so quickly. While we know as the audience that all of these things are managed using less-than-magical means, this is by far the best film version for illustrating the Phantom's ghostly grip on the opera house and the minds of its inhabitants; we can see why they believe, which makes his unmolested existence in the vaults below far more plausible.

While I understood that Richardson was trying to make the antagonism between Christine and the other opera girls clear as well as establishing Philippe as a ladies' man, the handling of the scene was so anachronistic that I was too distracted to appreciate his intent. The gaggle of chorus girls jumping all over Philippe and fondling him was bad enough in its impropriety (even for opera girls of the time period, that sort of thing would have been confined behind closed doors, not indulged in an orgy in the front foyer), but the fact that they were all "naked" (nineteenth-century naked, meaning they were in their bloomers and lace, which was quite scandalous enough, thank you) in the front hall in front of any number of people was just ridiculous. Not only was it out of place for them to be so brazen, but it seems unlikely that even rakish, roving-eye Philippe would want to be jumped publicly by seven obvious whores (even a rake has a reputation to maintain when he's a Count; Raoul could possibly have gotten away with it in the original novel since he was still considered something of a "boy", but the removal of the older brother renders that scenario unworkable). Despite the improbability of the scene, however, Storke does an excellent job of showing us the contrast in behavior between Philippe's easy-going looseness with the opera girls and his sudden concern and almost boyish awkwardness when he leaves them to talk to Christine.

The Phantom, curiously enough, decides to send Christine on a date with Philippe, because the event will offer her the opportunity to perform and make herself known to the opera elite. We can't help but feel sorry for the poor bastard; he knows that Christine has some feelings for Philippe, but he sends her off anyway in order to advance her career. In putting Christine's career chances ahead of his own romantic desires, again, we are deliberately impressed by Erik's self-sacrificing niceness. He's so very, very nice. He cannot, however, resist staking his claim to her in the subtlest of manners before she leaves; he gives her a dress to wear, and laces up the corset for her himself. The intimacy of such an action would have been almost unheard of between unwedded couples, and several other factors (Christine's hair having been let down and the soft, intimate lighting, for example) give the scene an extremely sensual quality. Richardson cleverly splices in shots from the parallel scene going on in the bistro, and the bustle and raucous merry-making of the crowd make the pregnant silence and slow, sensual shots of Erik's fingers pulling at her laces all the more pronounced in their eroticism. Here, again, is a moment of clear delineation between Christine's choices: she is torn between the bright, colorful world of Philippe's gaiety and the dark, silent sensualism of Erik's realm.

The vocal "battle" between Christine and Carlotta is absolutely delightful; Christine's voice, which really is lovely by this point, lacks Carlotta's power but bests her in technique, while Carlotta clearly has talent but is unable to achieve the plateau of ability upon which Christine resides. Having them sing side by side is a stroke of genius from Richardson, and allows us in the audience to weigh their relative merits and choose Christine as the winner without being railroaded into it by sloppy characterization or blatant attempts to discredit Carlotta purely for the plot's sake. The scene achieves exactly the right musical balance, and is one of my favorites in the film. Erik, who is listening outside the window, is also handled well; the alternating shots of the warmly colored interior of the bistro and the cold, dark evening in which the Phantom is lurking continue the visual dichotomy that was set up in the previous scene. The comparison also nicely emphasizes the Phantom's state as someone doomed to solitary emotion instead of fellowship.

And then there's a can-can with lots of bloomers and wiggling bottoms, and Philippe and Christine wisely leave before the entire place turns into a brothel.

The interlude in which Christine and Philippe (seriously, do you have any idea how many times in this review I've typed "Raoul" and then had to go back and fix it? It's driving me absolutely bonkers) affirm their budding love is one of great character growth for both. For Christine, it is a blossoming; she is coming somewhat out of her shell of shy fear, which has been her trademark for most of the film so far, and becoming visibly happier and more carefree as we watch, qualities that clue us in that she is definitely positively influenced by Philippe's presence. Philippe himself is, interestingly, stealing the Phantom's thunder a bit; he is being essentially redeemed (from his philandering, no-good ways) by Christine's love and entering a kind of second childhood, wherein he rediscovers the delights of innocent, unconditional love.

There does turn out to be a childhood love between the two of them after all, though Philippe doesn't actually remember it until Christine reminds him; the childhood link helps explain to us why Philippe suffers such an abrupt emotional about-face when it comes to Christine, and elicits a great deal of sentimentality for the innocent, pure nature of their relationship (which, of course, highlights the difference between this relationship and Philippe's previous flings). While the presentation of it all is pretty hilariously overdramatic (I particularly enjoyed when Christine told him and he said, "Christine... oh, my god!", and all I could think of was his internal monologue saying, "Holy shit, you were my MAID? Error! Error!"), especially near the end when Christine and her father are turned out into the cold and there's the classic children reaching desperately for one another through iron bars, crying, "Noooooo!" like separated lovers, it gets the point across despite its occasional slips of logic (where did a country maid learn to play piano? Maybe Papa Daae has a portable piano in his violin case, too). We understand that Christine represents innocence and pure love, and that Philippe falls in love with her and rejects the inferior delights of the carnal shenanigans he's been involved in. Entertainingly, Philippe is here making the same choice that Christine is traditionally faced with, going all the way back to Leroux's original novel: faced with the choice between innocent, pure childhood love and the sexual, somewhat frightening love of adulthood, he chooses to remain (or in his case, return to being) a child.

Carlotta is making trouble back at the opera house during all of this, as she's feeling unsurprisingly threatened by Christine's sudden catapult to stardom. I was baffled that she apparently knew that Christine was living in the opera house; who told her that? When? Didn't Jean-Claude say not to tell anyone because he might get fired and because it was essentially trespassing? But, somehow, she knows, because it is essential to the plot that she bother Christine some here. My annoyance at this thinly-disguised contrivance was somewhat mitigated by my favorite line of the film, uttered when Carlotta is arguing with her husband over where Christine's training had come from; when he suggests that she might just be naturally talented, Carlotta snaps scathingly, "No one can sing bel canto without lessons. God doesn't allow it." Sing it, sistah.

As a side note, it's interesting to see that Richardson has chosen to give Philippe some musical talent of his own; in his childhood flashbacks, we see him playing piano with Christine and later playing a recorder of his own. Not only does this offer his oft-professed enjoyment of the opera a plausibility beyond his enjoyment of the opera girls, but it also adds a dimension of empathy between him and Christine that goes beyond Raoul's in the original novel. His musical talent and insight, small though it might be, allows him to be involved in or appreciate Christine's musical talent to some extent, which makes him a more sympathetic, "appropriate" mate for her than a non-musical soldier clod like the original character would be. While it does make the relationship between them a little bit stronger, it also hurts the comparison between Erik and Philippe; where Erik's musicality was originally representative of passion and a certain transcendent sensuality that Raoul was lacking, Christine's choice is now between two men who can appreciate her musical talent, even if one is clearly not comparable to the other in terms of ability.

Being the silly, flighty little thing that she is (which is odd, because she's been pretty responsible and shyly thoughtful so far--must be Philippe rubbing off on her), Christine stays out too late and has to rush back to the opera house when she realizes that she's late for her lesson with Erik. Philippe, like the original Raoul, immediately descends into moping, pouting, and generally throwing jealous tantrums, none of which behaviors are helped by the fact that Christine refuses to tell him who she's rushing to in such a hurry. Of course, Erik isn't there when she shows up, being elsewhere moping over the fact that he just sent his twoo wuv off to make kissy-face with his arch-rival, but Christine's distress and devotion to the Phantom are obvious when she collapses on his piano in tears. Polo does an excellent job of giving us small cues that let us know that her heart isn't completely sold on Philippe and his childlike love; her hands stroking the piano in her extremity, in particular, are quite sensual and effective, as is her apparent obliviousness to them.

Interestingly, when Erik first questions Christine about her previous evening, she lies and tells him that she was out with Carlotta; the untruth is illuminating because it reveals that Christine feels guilty for having abandoned the Phantom for her beau, but also that she is unwilling to hurt his feelings by telling him about it. She is aware at some level that Erik is at least infatuated with her, if not actually in love, and so she is motivated to tread lightly around the subject of Philippe. Of course, Dance's version of Erik is much too nice a guy to get angry at her even though he is perfectly aware that she's lying, so he just suffers in wounded silence until she breaks down and confesses (which confession also reveals that she is still indecisive--were she sold on the whole Philippe idea, she would have less inclination to apologize so profusely to Erik for her runaround ways). Then she rushes him for a bear hug, and I was deeply entertained to see Dance put on a credible show of simultaneously panicking and being forced to think about cold showers while his hands hovered in midair to avoid touching anything. Christine doesn't notice anything particularly unusual in this hug, which tells us that this version of the Phantom is clearly humanoid-feeling (unlike Leroux's corpse-like, grave-smelling recluse); it's not much of a surprise, since Richardson is determined to humanize Erik like whoa and hell damn in this film.

Unlike pretty much every previous version of the Phantom, Dance's Erik is apparently not up on his inner-wall lurking and impression of omniscience, because things are going on all the time--sometimes even in the cellars--that he doesn't seem to know about. Along with everything else, this adds to the cumulative effect which convinces us beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is a mortal, fallible Phantom (despite the bewilderingly convincing ghostly shenanigans he pulls off now and then).

Despite Christine's promise to Erik that she would not divulge his identity, Carlotta manages to bully her into giving away enough to pinpoint him as the Phantom. In an obvious hearkening back to the 1983 Markowitz/Schnell film, Cholet and Carlotta hatch a plot with Ledoux to capture the Phantom when he shows up to hear Christine sing Marguerite in the production of Faust (Carlotta had thrown a tantrum and refused to sing earlier, which gives them a plausible reason to plunk Christine down center stage). By keeping her so intimately involved int he proceedings, Richardson is thrusting Carlotta into the role of primary antagonist; God knows the Phantom isn't much of a villain in this version, and the audience needs someone to root against. So, in another move that is eerily reminiscent of Webber's musical version (though reversed), Carlotta serves Christine a drink before the show that renders her unable to sing, making her debut a total disaster since all she can do is stand there and cry (again, reminiscent of the 1983 film and Elena's catastrophic debut). Unfortunately for Cholet's carefully laid plans, this so enrages Erik that he rushes backstage, cuts the rope that drops the chandelier so that it crashes into the audience (since Madame Giry has been removed in this version, the motive of squashing her replacement has also been removed), and then grabs Christine and absconds with her before anyone can figure out what's happening. As the first truly wicked thing we've seen Erik do, the chandelier-dropping ought to be a red flag showing off his evil side, but it really isn't; Dance plays the character as clearly so upset that he is barely aware of what he's doing, hacking away unseeingly at a rope with his sword and then fleeing with Christine for safekeeping. The effect is that the Phantom, once again, isn't really at fault for his actions--it's Carlotta's fault for being such a raving beeyotch.

The transition from the opera house to the catacombs beneath it is especially powerful because the underground world that the Phantom inhabits has remained an unknown quantity up to this point; most pointedly, Christine has not made the connection between her music teacher and the fabled Phantom, so she has never suspected him of supernaturalism--ergo, this is an unexpected and wholly magical wonderland that she finds herself descending into (via dragon-prowed Norse boat, yet!). The lake is the only "set" used in the film, since the rest was filmed on location, but it's a lovely one, gorgeously and evocatively lit and filled with props from the opera house that lend it an otherworldly aura despite their mundane origins.

Erik sings the bewildered and worried Christine a little bit of a lullaby here, and I was mildly disappointed. I mean, he has a pretty voice and all, but it definitely wasn't magically entrancing or angelically transcendent. It was just a pretty nice voice.

While all this is going on, Ledoux is leading some policemen down into the bowels of the opera house in an attempt to capture the Phantom, a choice that is probably based on the 1983 film's police pursuit (which was in turn based on the 1925 film's mob chase). We finally get a hanging, which was the original Phantom's trademark method of execution (it's not for Dance's Phantom, however; this is the only time we'll see it, and we won't actually see it happen. There's no mention of the Punjab lasso), the victim of which is an unfortunate police officer (which is reminiscent of the demises of the police officers in both the 1983 and the 1989 films). This is the only actual murder that the Phantom perpetrates in the entire film, but we don't see him at all connected with it; the policeman just turns up hung in the cellar, and everyone makes a dash back upstairs (another policeman dies when, so surprised by the hanged man, he falls into some machinery, but that can't really be attributed to Erik). By leaving the Phantom completely out of the scene and just letting his guilt be implied, Richardson keeps him from being viewed as a murderer on that visceral level, which is important as it allows him to keep the character at tragic hero status (rather than murdering villain).

Christine, upon waking and finding herself in Erik's unfamiliar house, proceeds to become totally illogical and somewhat flighty. First she puts on a dress she finds in the house (why? I could not tell you. She just felt it was the thing to do at the time), and then goes wandering through it touching everything while her host is out. It's in this part of the film that I begin to become very confused as to chronology and influences. There are paintings of Christine all over Erik's house, which is confusing enough (when did Erik become a painter?), but there's also a cradle with a headless doll in it. Aside from the creepiness factor of that, did anyone else just get hit between the eyes by the hammer of Susan Kay influence? Even if we ignore the doll in the cradle (which is strongly reminiscent of the doll that Erik tricked his mother into believing was a living baby in Susan Kay's Phantom), we later discover that Christine looks and sounds exactly like Erik's mother, which may be one of the reasons he's so taken with her--and which was an extremely central point to his relationship with her in Kay's novel. No version previous to Kay's included that idea that Christine was somehow related to or reminiscent of Erik's mother, but I'm given pause by the fact that Kay's novel was published the same year this miniseries aired; additionally, Kopit claims that he had written the play upon which this miniseries was based several years previous to filming. So it seems impossible that Kay's novel could have influenced this version--but if it didn't, what are the odds that they'd both come up with the exact same concept for Erik's relationship with Christine? Is it possible that Kay could have been influenced by the miniseries, instead (it came out in March of 1990, and her novel was published at the end of the year)? Certainly, Kay does not mention it with the other films in her acknowledgments. Or is it possible that they both coincidentally came up with the same idea at the same time, as a response to the themes of Leroux's original novel (specifically, that Christine functions as a mother figure for Erik as well as a love interest, and that there are no other mother figures in the novel besides the removed-in-this-version Madame Giry)? I'll have to keep an eagle eye out for any future adaptations that do this, but for now it's a mystery, and one I would dearly love to solve.

While Christine is wandering around in his house, Erik is having a heated argument with Carriere, who is once again fulfilling the role of the Persian from Leroux's original novel (many of his lines here, such as, "Erik, you must send her back," are directly borrowed from Leroux's text). This Phantom has a very interestingly inverted view of the world: he informs Carriere that his realm is not hell, that "...that up there is where hell is," and thus refuses to send Christine there. I can't help feeling that Dance's Phantom is really chill about his fate. He sounds cranky about it a few times, true, but not nearly to the extent of Leroux's Erik, who knew himself to be condemned to an underworld and barred from an upper world that he considered, if not entirely divine, at least a little bit heavenly.

By the way, those wishing for a nice demise for Carlotta will be only slightly appeased. This Phantom is way too nice to go killing women, so instead he tells her off and then dumps a trunk full of rats on her, causing her to instantly lose her mind and spend the rest of her screen time screaming, shrieking, or singing inanely while she waltzes around or cowers in the extremity of a psychotic break. It annoyed me, frankly; it was a moment of blatant fanservice, and it aggravated me that Richardson didn't have the balls to kill her but also didn't have the creativity to do something more interesting than just have her go bonkers and wander off.

During Carriere's and Erik's conversation, we see him carting around the barrels of gunpowder for the blowing up of the opera house, an unexpected return to Leroux's original plot; no other film version, with the exception of the 1925 Julian/Chaney, has included any part of that scene (though this version does stop short of including the scorpion and grasshopper, unfortunately, because forcing Christine to make a choice in that manner is outside the scope of this gentler, kinder Phantom). One of the most revealing lines of the entire film for Erik is here, where he tells Carriere that, "I was born so that she could save me," his voice full of wondering joy at having finally discovered this purpose to his life. The statement is extremely telling; Erik is, as a much more human character, seeking meaning for his life and for the trials that he has endured, which makes him fundamentally different from Leroux's character (who knew, bitterly, that he was living as a cruel joke from God and that there was no purpose to his life).

Erik orders Carriere to leave the catacombs and never come back, but while the Phantom's off securing his realm, Carriere breaks into his house anyway in a misguided attempt to rescue Christine. In another departure from pretty much every other version of the story ever, Christine doesn't want to go anywhere (even though she was just kidnapped by a crazy man and left in an unfamiliar bed miles underground; remember, this is Kinder Gentler Phantom, and she trusts him), so Carriere is forced to stop and give us a big heaping dollop of background on the Phantom in his attempts to convince her that she isn't safe down here. Some of his assertions seem groundless, for example his insistence to Christine that "[Erik] doesn't understand your world"; I've seen no convincing evidence of that, since Erik does a great job of being a member of humanity in this film. More interesting is the flashback, in which it is revealed that Carriere is actually Erik's father (raise your hands, anyone who didn't see that coming. No one? ...well, okay then). While this doesn't exactly come as a shock in light of the way he's been behaving throughout the film, this is nevertheless the first film retelling to give Erik a real and present father figure, which he of course lacks in the original novel (in which God really plays the role of the distant and unloving father). The storytelling style here is somewhat stilted and hokey; blurring lenses lead us into flashbacks, which are constantly narrated by Carriere. The upshot of it all is that Erik's mother, who thought he was cute as a button and had no problem with his deformity, died when he was three years old and left him with Carriere, who couldn't bear to look at him but has nevertheless raised him from afar for all these years. Erik, naturally, was never told and apparently believes Carriere to be an uncle or something, because that makes sense. It's also revealed that Erik has been de facto running the opera house for the past decade or so, which calls Webber's version of the Phantom more to mind than Leroux's. Despite all this exposition and reasonable cajoling, Christine refuses to leave, saying that Erik deserves for her to say goodbye and explain herself, and Carriere is forced to return to the surface without her.

Upon Erik's return, he decides to take Christine on a picnic, which is bizarre, to say the least. In the most obvious (indeed, pretty much the only) sign of mental instability we've seen out of the Phantom so far, he takes her to his underground forest, which he has created himself to ape the real world above. The trees and sunlight are all fake, of course, created with props and lights and pieces of theatre stock, and the stuffed deer and birds he has dotting the landscape are downright creepy. This is the part of the film where Christine would normally unmask the Phantom and there would be much wailing and gnashing of teeth, but since the dynamic between them has been so fundamentally changed from Leroux's original (by Erik's surprising and continual humanity and by Christine's complete lack of fear of him), the sudden, violent moment of discovery is replaced here by Christine gently begging Erik to show her his face of his own volition. Of course, he refuses, but as she persists (and eventually hits him with the one-two punch with the statement, "If your mother could look on your face and love you, so can I!") he eventually takes off the mask for her. And of course she promptly faints, and he promptly goes insane from the omgANGST of it all, and the melodrama, she is choking me! The most important elements of this scene are Christine's confession of love--make no mistake, this Christine loves Erik, which is a big fat change (or at least, her admission of it is) from Leroux's original and all the previous film versions--and the fact that Richardson once again doesn't show us Erik's face, leaving us to wonder what, exactly, the big deal is. My notes at this point say, "This deformity better be worth it," which pretty much sums up my feelings on how overly-hyped this buildup is getting.

I was frankly pretty bored by the Phantom's little tantrum downstairs. He runs around breaking shit and crying. Big deal. I would have been impressed that he locked Christine in a cage, except that he didn't actually lock her in anything since she promptly opened the door and escaped. The whole thing was more juvenile than frightening, and since Dance's Phantom hasn't been set up to be scary in the least, Richardson's attempt to make us worry about Christine fell regrettably flat.

Philippe, who has been freaking out this whole time over Christine's kidnapping (and who also, incidentally, is a dead ringer for Ashton Kutcher with long hair--how weird is that?) immediately whisks her off to take care of her, after a short, fatherly talk with Carriere (Carriere, as the appointed father figure of the film, is not only Erik's real father but also the effective father figure for both Philippe, who doesn't have the older brother he had in the novel, and Christine, whose relationship with the Phantom has had that component almost completely removed in order to avoid the squicky incest angle from annoying viewers) in which he declares that he's willing to give up his philandering ways for her because he really, truly loves her. Christine reacts to this sacrifice for love by immediately raving about how much she regrets her actions, how she can't believe she left Erik like that, and by calling the Phantom "love" repeatedly in her delusional fervor. Ouch, man. Philippe tries to tough it out, but he eventually has to leave the room to avoid breaking down or becoming incensed by her behavior, and I can't really blame him; this scene, and most of the rest of the film, establish him as a good man who is, ultimately, second best to Erik, who is a better man.

In case things weren't melodramatic enough yet, Erik begins dying of a broken heart in his vaults under the opera (apparently, broken hearts make you cough a lot for dramatic effect). Christine sees this in a dream (seriously?) and demands Philippe help her with increasing levels of hysteria until he gives in (only after she promises she won't go back underground, however, because Philippe is a sensible person). Her plan involves convincing Cholet to let her sing Faust again, because Erik will hear it in his lair and understand that she's singing it just for him because she loves him (yes, she says this right to Philippe's face. Poor Philippe). Cholet allows this because he figures that he can fill the building with police again, and catch the Phantom if he shows up personally to hear Christine sing.

We digress from the opera shenanigans so that Carriere and Erik can have a tearful, dramatic scene below the opera house, in which Erik tells us all about how he's at peace and he's philosophically letting Christine go (even though he never did actually let her go, since she escaped his attempts to hold onto her), and Carriere finally tells Erik that he's his father (which he already knew, because he is not an idiot). The whole thing was a bit overdone, though it did include another moment of pretty entertaining humor, when after Carriere tells Erik that his mother thought his face was beautiful and Erik asks him what he thought, Carriere says delicately, "Well... I thought it could be better." The scene also contains another example of Richardson teasing the audience, when Erik offers to unmask for his father but ends up not doing so. Despite the melodrama of the scene, the parts of the film in which Erik and Carriere discuss have the best, most snappily delivered and entertaining dialogue.

Erik sends Carriere away so that he can die alone with dignity, but of course right after that Christine starts to sing, and the sound of her voice mysteriously cures him with the power of lurve, and he hauls his sick, dying ass up to his normal box to listen to her sing. Christine, who apparently never took classes on subtlety, immediately turns her back on the guy playing Faust and sings the rest of the piece ("Ah! Do I Hear My Lover's Voice?", which is fittingly sung by Marguerite when Faust arrives to bust her out of prison) directly to Erik in his box, which clues in any remaining oblivious police officers that Target One is in the building. We can't lay all the blame on Christine, however, since Erik starts to sing Faust's part over the poor guy onstage, who continues to try to bust it out but is usually overwhelmed (again, shades of Webber's musical, in which the Phantom took over the stage actor's role of Don Juan, appear). The two of them are transcendentally happy, declaring their love for one another in front of the whole world (while poor Philippe sits in the audience and looks very, very depressed).

Then, of course, the police open fire (they were polite enough to wait until the end of the duet, weren't they?) and the Phantom leaps onto the stage in a move borrowed straight from the 1962 Fisher/Lom film, grabs Christine, and takes off once again, this time to the roof of the opera. His choice of locale is ironic as the roof was the location of Christine's and Raoul's engagement in Leroux's novel, and things are so far from that original narrative that they might as well be unconnected stories at this point. Philippe and the police give chase and manage to corner the Phantom on the roof, but not before Erik busts out a sword (again, sword-fighting seems to be borrowed from Webber's stage version) and almost kills Philippe by hurling him off the roof. Of course, he doesn't, because Christine asks him not to and he's such a damned nice guy, so instead he flees to the top point of the roof, where he is held at bay. Carriere arrives and glares at him, and in my favorite comedy move of the film, Erik shrugs at him. I have no idea how this happened, Dad! Sorry! Those crazy coppers, eh?

Since the police are trying to take Erik alive, and the Phantom had earlier made his father promise that after he died no one would put his face on display, and since Richardson made a point of showing us Carriere rushing off to retrieve a pistol earlier, it's not exactly a shock that Carriere shoots his son to prevent his being taken alive. Christine, safe with Philippe on the other side of the roof, becomes hysterical and runs to Erik's side, and everyone gets to have a nice tearful death scene (everyone except Philippe. He doesn't count for much here). Christine removes Erik's mask, still not letting us see his face because her head is always in the way, and gives him the kiss on the forehead that was the crux of Leroux's Phantom's happiness, and then she replaces the mask and he dies while everyone weeps. Our last shot is of Philippe marching Christine off into the sunset, presumably to spend the rest of his life watching her mope over another dude even though she's married to him.

And the film is over, and ten thousand people suddenly shout in outrage, "Wait, we never got to see his face!"

That's right: Richardson has the last laugh. The Phantom's face is never revealed. I'm of two minds about this choice. On the one hand, I think it was pretty much the only choice to be made by the end of the film; the buildup and constant teasers had created a level of hype that no makeup artist could possibly have lived up to, and any unveiling after all that would have been anti-climactic and disappointing. On the other hand, an audience denied that moment of cathartic horror and pity is a cranky audience indeed. In the end, I actually disagree with the critics on this point; I think it was a valid artistic choice to exclude an actual visual view of the Phantom's face. Especially when, as is being done here, the goal is to make the Phantom a sympathetic and human character, it's much more effective to let the pity for the character come from his mistreatment at the hands of others, rather than to show the audience the hideous root cause and trust them to come up with their own reaction, which even if favorable would probably still include at least a small element of horror and/or revulsion. I'm not a big fan of the direction Richardson took this film, but the lack of an unmasking is definitely the best choice for that direction.

It's extremely interesting, when all's said and done, to realize that Philippe is the character that really achieves redemption here; Erik, who has essentially done nothing wrong, never repented, and is doomed without having ever done anything to deserve it, certainly has no fall from grace from which he can be redeemed. Philippe is redeemed from his self-destructive, shallow lifestyle into one of love and happiness with Christine, but the Phantom just gets to die, because he is a tragic hero and that's what tragic heroes do. It's both gratifying and mystifying to see the theme of redemption turned on its head this way; in the end, it left me cold, because while I appreciated including Philippe in the proceedings (it can only enhance Christine's role as divine savior, after all, if she saves both men instead of just one), I could not get past the fact that Erik was basically innocent in all this mess. He was never redeemed because he never had any demons to overcome, and that omission completely removed the themes of man overcoming his inner monster and love conquering the most damaged, twisted of souls. It was sad that he died, yeah, and it was unfair, but it didn't mean anything, and without meaning there's no story worth remembering.

In the end, this is a tragedy, and has almost no elements of horror. All of the "evil" elements of the original novel have been removed, even the hideous face, and that weakens the plot irreparably. I care much less about a nice guy getting killed because of a misunderstanding than I do about a man who must struggle with his own personal demons and achieve personal redemption against all odds. They're fundamentally different stories.

(Cross-posted from The Phantom Project.)

:)

Sat, 03 May 2008 15:50:14 GMT

Nothing could make me stop smiling today.

The 'Zine Dilemma

Thu, 01 May 2008 00:35:57 GMT

Digression into Phantom Project territory again, so apologies to those of you that are actually concerned with what I'm doing with my life (not much, as usual).

I'm having thoughts: specifically, thoughts on fanzines. More to the point, should stories in fanzines count under my self-imposed criteria? I definitely said that I wasn't going to be doing fanfiction that hadn't been published, partly out of the hope for some small amount of quality control and partly because I'd be old and grey before I finished every bit of Phantom-based fanfiction out there. Fanzine stories are, essentially, fanfiction (someone's just printed them out and stapled them together, basically), but do they count as published? I mean, having a story published in an established magazine like, say, Fantasy & Science Fiction definitely means that you're published, even if said story isn't published in a book.

I hear that there are both really bad and really good stories out there in the fanzine circulation. Certainly, they'd be prime examples of how peoples' perceptions shape their retelling of stories--these are people retelling the story to one another, purely for the joy of it.

However, do I really want to open this can of worms? And if so, does anyone with a little more insight into the 'zine scene have any advice or thoughts on it?

A few good things

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 15:12:34 GMT

An awesome thing: It's mebemojo's birthday, and she's so much cooler than I am that we don't even register on the same scale.

A not-so-awesome thing: She is far, far away in NC and I can't give her birthday hugs.

An awesome thing: John got a job as the drama instructor for a summer camp full of chilluns. It will be fabulous for everyone involved.

A not-so-awesome thing: Said job doesn't start until June, which means that I still might have to pawn one of my kidneys to make the rent.

An awesome thing: John.

A not-so-awesome thing: How cranky I am with John when I come home after I've had a hard day of work and old ladies have been taking one look at me and saying things like, "Oh, dear, you didn't get any sleep at all last night, did you?" and "Oh, honey, that base is really unattractive for your skin tone," when I am, in fact, not wearing any makeup.

An awesome thing: Gummi bears.

A not-so-awesome thing: Someone spilled soda or juice or something in my work keyboard yesterday and it's really, really hard to type now.

I could sleep for a week.