If you can get on its dank and heavy wavelength, the whole project is so aesthetically rich that it manages to transcend that it’s, at heart, a lot of dressed-up goofiness.
Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera (2004)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:163
Fresh:54
Rotten:109
Average Rating:5/10
Consensus: The music of the night has hit something of a sour note: Critics are calling the screen adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s popular musical histrionic, boring, and lacking in both romance and danger. Still, some have praised the film for its sheer spectacle.
Rated: PG-13 [See Full Rating] for brief violent images
Runtime: 2 hrs 23 mins
Genre: Musical & Performing Arts
Theatrical Release:Dec 22, 2004 Limited
Box Office: $51,193,556
Synopsis: Those who thought that smoke machines and cobwebbed candelabras were the stuff of Halloween parties and dance clubs need to think again. In Joel Schumacher's film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd... Those who thought that smoke machines and cobwebbed candelabras were the stuff of Halloween parties and dance clubs need to think again. In Joel Schumacher's film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Broadway musical THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, these moody set devices--and countless others--make every scene an atmospheric vision of souped-up 19th-century Gothic bliss. Christine Daee (a luminescent Emmy Rossum) is a tortured young star who is haunted by the voice of the phantom (Gerard Butler--who also played the lead in DRACULA 2000), a musician who hides in the shadows to hide a facial disfigurement, yet sings to her obsessively. Dwelling in the dark, damp chambers beneath the Paris opera house, the phantom lords over the cast and management with artistic autocracy--he writes the shows, casts them, and threatens all who disobey his plans with dramatically violent outbursts. But when his young student Christine falls for the rich and dapper Raoul (Patrick Wilson), the phantom descends into madness. Webber's memorable songs are performed with aplomb by Rossum, whose background includes singing with the Metropolitan Opera, and Wilson and Butler provide ample accompaniment. One of the treats of the proceedings is Minnie Driver's deeply exaggerated portrayal of the jealous diva, giving this PHANTOM a very appropriate dose of comic relief. [More]
Starring: Gerard Butler, Emmy Rossum, Minnie Driver, Patrick Wilson
Starring: Gerard Butler, Emmy Rossum, Minnie Driver, Patrick Wilson, Miranda Richardson
Director: Joel Schumacher
Director: Joel Schumacher
Screenwriter: Andrew Lloyd Webber, Joel Schumacher
Producer: Andrew Lloyd Webber
Composer: Andrew Lloyd Webber
Studio: Warner Bros.
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Reviews for Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera
(Joel Schumacher) tenía ganas de hacer un musical y se sacó las ganas; sólo que no bastaba con poner gente cantando envuelta en trajes brillantes.
Phantom is as bloated as Monty Python’s Mr. Creosote, and is so stagebound that it’s just about as agile as that character.
The big-screen rendition of The Phantom of the Opera resembles a ridiculously expensive installment of Masterpiece Theatre.
My own reaction to the current version fashioned by Mr. Schumacher is one of pure stupefaction.
An awkward, overstuffed and occasionally painful delusion of grandeur ...
Could have used some 'star power,' but overall should make Webber followers happy
Even the most die-hard "Phantom" aficionados might be struck dumb by the sheer level of the crescendo and camp Schumacher achieves here.
What could have been a campy calamity boasts some surprising elegance. But there is zero romantic heat and a vocally and emotionally flat performance from Gerard Butler.
The main problem is that the actors cast in the film can't really sing
no amount of stylistic playfulness could stop the film from bogging down into tedium by the last reel, as the romantic pathos begins to wear thin
The plot is impressively free of anything that does not smell of unpasteurized melodrama.
Schumacher has indeed delivered the lavish, lushly romantic film that fans have envisioned for years.
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