Delt...

Let me add some perspective on this...my DH is a drama teacher and has lived his life on the stage (just as your son). He hates the stage show too...I even had to drag him to see it for my birthday last year and went as a personal favor to me! (Now that's love!!! LOL)...

He agreed to go to the movie with me and actually liked it!!! Shocker of shockers! He liked the cinematography, the acting, the sets and the way the music was portrayed...they make a major change in the movie (the chandelier) and he liked what changes they made...

I saw it Sunday with the fam and thought it was ...in a word...spectacular!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Emmy Rossum's voice is pure gold. Wow. We thought they did a phenomenal job with this.

I do not plan on seeing the movie. I do not care for ALW. I find his works to be 'flash and trash'. Its theatre that has been dumbed down for the masses and there is nothing intellectually interesting about it at all. The plots are weak and formulaic and the stories are bland.

I'll save my $7.50 thanks.

Loved it!
 

I just got back from the cinema and thought it was great! A lot of other versions, stage productions included, lack a phantom with any humanity. Gerard Butler did a wonderful job on making the Phantom a real man, instead of just some ethereal ghost flouncing around the Paris sewers.

I also liked the variety in singing voices: some edgier (the Phantom), some less trained (Meg), some over the top (Carlotta), it added a realism.

This is definitely going to be a DVD and soundtrack purchase for me, if I can get my hands on them. :)

~ShyViolet

ps - Gerard Butler is sooo sexy, but then again I have a thing for Scottish men. ;)

I thought it was good.
 

I have total ADD and couldn't sit through the whole movie (a couple trips just to get out of my seat). Like at times I felt it dragged, but it was pretty entertaining at the end. I think they all did pretty superb jobs- esp. with the singing, and I thought the Phantom was pretty hot too (just leave the mask on). Probably one of the biggest reasons that I appreciated it is because they did a good job at humanizing the Phantom. I kind of felt bad for him.


BTW, ASUADPi, it is funny that you say in no way can Sarah Brightman do the role. Andrew Lloyd Weber definitely created the music specifically with her in mind. I think she is good but you are right; she's too old.

polarpink you misunderstood what I said. I was saying that SB could no longer do the role NOW. One, she is too old and two, her voice has COMPLETELY changed.

Yes, I understand that he wrote the role for her but it doesn't mean that she owns the role.

I have seen Phantom on stage several times, 2 of those times being on Broadway. Due to this, I wasn't really expecting anything from the movie. I figured it couldn't be anywhere near as wonderful as the play is. But I LOVED it. I cried just as much as I always do, and I liked how the movie filled in some gaps in the story that I had never gotten before. Definitely will be buying this the minute it comes out on DVD and I've already bought the soundtrack. ;)

I plan on going to see this movie this afternoon after I saw the HBO thing on it. I saw the stage play in London(1998) and after years of hearing how great it was, I was SO disappointed after I left. I mean it was good, it just wasn't great and definitely wasn't up to all the talk I'd heard about it. Maybe I saw a mediocre cast or something, but to me the movie looks really good.

POTO was ALW's last great work. I don't think anything he wrote after that was any good at all and the last few productions have flopped miserably!

I saw the movie today, and I'm not even going to try to compare it to the stage production. You can't, really, as there are things that can be done on screen that is impossible to do realistically on stage (e.g. horse back scenes). There are also things that seem "magical" on stage that isn't really on screen (e.g. chandelier falling...it's "scarier" live).

I personally liked the black and white footage and epilogue, which I don't believe was in the stage production (the cemetary scene at the very end).

While I agree POTO is more popular...Sunset Bouvelard was considered a success on Broadway (won MANY Tony's!!), Los Angeles and London...

After that, I do agree everything else has been a flop..

For those of us who have seen the movie (For those who haven't seen it: Don't worry, it doesn't ruin the plot or anything):

Who do you think the older woman is? Some say that it is Meg Giry, others have said that it is Mme Giry, who just happened to have kept herself very healthy (after all, she was a dancer). There's a debate about this in IMDB.

That's definitely Miranda Richardson....so I'm guessing Mme Giry....

But it could have been Ms. Richardson playing Meg at 60-something. Is the cemetary scene in the novel? Anyone read it who can confirm?

When my mom and I saw it, we both thought that the older woman was Madame Giry, although I do think it's kind of weird how Mme. Giry is older than Raoul, yet 49 years later, he looks A LOT older than her.

Okay I have the liberetto and Raoul is supposed to be 70 at the time of the auction. Now the years in the play are different than the movie. The auction takes place in 1905 (in the movie it is 1919). The movie takes place in 1870 (the play in 1881). Either way Christine is supposed to be 16 at the time (1870 or 1881).

The liberetto doesn't say anything about Mme. Giry being there. So, I put on the soundtrack and even in the soundtrack the auctioneer states "thank you madame".

Okay, just using logic here. The phantom can't be more than 35. Mme. Giry is, at most, five years older. So she would be around 40. Meg is probably the same age as Christine, so 16. The phantom is obviously still alive at the end of the movie, so it is only feasible that Mme. Giry would still be alive.

In the movie it is definately Miranda Richardson at the auction. Everytime I've seen it on stage it has been Mme. Giry, so I have to assume Miranda was playing Mme. Giry and not an older Meg.

Hope I made some sort of sense in my craziness.