Review of The Phantom of the Opera (2004) by Zal — 11 Jan 2012

It's certainly an improvement for Joel Schumacher since Batman and Robin, but I still did not enjoy this film.

With the exception of Erik, all of these characters are completely bland. This is not the fault of Schumacher or any of the actors. None of these characters, especially Raoul and Christine, were very interesting to begin with. And even Erik in this film isn't that deep, especially when you see that his "deformity" is really just a big rash. It doesn't look that bad and it makes his song about his face seem, well, somewhat pretentious, which is a word that I feel sad using to describe one of my favorite literary anti-heroes.

The acting isn't that great either. The only one who I thought did a decent job was Patrick Wilson as Raoul. Then there is poor Miranda Richardson doing an incredibly over the top French accent that was hard not to laugh at. This is sad because I genuinly love Miranda Richardson and think she is a fantastic actress, but her acting in this movie was terrible. I don't even understand why she has that accent since everyone else is phoning it in and just doing a British accent, with the exception of Carlotta (since she is Italian) and Raoul and Christine, who for some reason speak with American accents.

The costumes and sets are creative and well made and some of the singing isn't bad, but it just wasn't a pleasant experience for me.