Review of Phantom of the Paradise (1974) by Devon B — 29 Oct 2008

An odd movie along the lines of "Deathrace 2000", Phantom of the Paradise attempts to re-tell the "Phantom of the Opera" story in an updated, rock-n-roll style, comedic form. It stars Paul Williams (writer of such classic songs as "We've Only Just Begun", "Just An Old Fashioned Love Song" and "Rainbow Connection") as the evil Swan, a record producer who somehow is in league with the devil, and now acts as an agent of him.

William Finley is the innocent song-writer, horribly mutilated and otherwise done wrong by the evil Swan. It's after Swan steals his greatest work, a massive operatic interpretation of Faust, that the innocent song-writer becomes The Phantom, and begins to haunt Swan's new music venue, the Paradise.

Jessica Harper stars as the (very plain) singer the Phantom becomes infatuated with, and in the process, he sells his soul to Swan in order to make her a star. But somehow, Swan betrays the contract and gives the music over to "Beef" (Gerrit Graham), an up and coming (and super-DUPER gay) rock singer who has a flair for bad guitar playing and overly dramatic swishing about the stage.

This is such an affront to the Phantom, that he goes crazy and attempts to destroy the whole show. Phantom of the Paradise is an early film of Brian De Palma's (it came 2 years before he directed "Carrie"), and it's not the greatest piece of directing.

In fact, it's pretty lousy in spots, and could've used alot of editing. Some scenes seem to go on forever. The music, written by Williams, was nominated for an Oscar in 1975, but it's baffling as to why, because it's uniformly pretty awful.

In fact, the biggest flaw in the movie is the music, and that's a pretty big flaw indeed when the movie in question is a musical. The acting is pretty generic all around, except for Gerrit Graham, whose portrayal of Beef is so campy and over the top, it seems he was the only one to realize he's in this movie to entertain.

Also, Paul Williams is incredibly short. As for the plot, there are so many twists and holes that I soon lost interest in what was happening on the screen (when Swan sent the composer to his private prison, they inexplicably removed his teeth to keep him safe from "germs".

.. huh?). I can only recommend this movie to people who partake in illegal substances, because I'm sure this movie is hilarious when you're high. Sober though, it's a bit much to sit through.