Mah-cah-BOO-high.

The Phantom of the Opera was disappointingly bad, which sucks because I really wanted to like it. It came of as a cheeseball gothic romance novel, and not in a good way. I thought it was a movie full of "almost, but not quite"'s. For example:

• Emmy Rossum was almost a good casting choice for Christine, except for the fact that her "acting" was composed of only one facial expression: the wide-eyed, open-mouthed look of [insert emotion here]. For variation, she sometimes produces tears on her eyes. Her voice was okay, but it wasn't exceptional. It started grating on me towards the end of her first aria, where she did the whole Mariah Carey, "OOO-ooo-OOO-ooo," inserting-too-many-notes-into-one-syllable thing.
• The Phantom was not nearly menacing or smoldering enough, which I suspected was what he should've been like, which was why Christine was sort of attracted to him in the first place before she realized he was a loon. He lacked the sexy villain appeal, and considering what he'd been through as a child, he's not disfigured enough. Also, not that good a singer.
• Raoul could've been my favorite character. I liked his singing voice. It was very nice and comforting, which was a nice change from all the soprano-like squealing/screeching. I liked the character, too, but he's very one-dimensional. He and Christine didn't have much chemistry. I didn't really get how they could fall in love with each other.
• It didn't balance the speaking/singing parts very well, and thus seemed inconsistent. Chicago worked because they had a clear cut between the speaking and singing parts -- one takes place in someone's head only, the other was reality. Here, people just seemed to be bursting into song in the middle of serious conversations, and it just seemed goofy. If they made it bigger, more fantastic and spectacular, flamboyant, mythical and unreal, it would probably work better.
• And were the present-day scenes with the auction and visiting Christine's grave part of the actual musical? Coz it probably didn't need to be. Those scenes seemed to served no purpose other than ruin the pacing of the movie.
• And who were the present-day guy and woman supposed to be anyway? If the guy were the phantom, one would wonder why he didn't get the plastic surgery early on. It might've done a lot for his self-esteem. He wouldn't get so crazy, and therefore, Christine would've liked him better. And in that case, there wouldn't be any movie, so no one would have to sit through this dreck at all.
• Why did Madam Whatshernamewhoisphantom'sfriend tell Raoul to hold his hand at eye level? Nothing happened that would justify this, and he never did it anyway.
• The ending was too easy and lame. No big fights? No death? Boo!

Ultimately, though, what ruined the whole movie for me was the very, very obnoxious Phantom groupie guy who was seated right next to me. He squealed like a little girl when the movie started and freakin' sang along with the songs, and he and his companion kept complaining LOUDLY about the noisy kids one row in front of us! Uh, Bitch? You're not so much better than them so SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!

Off-topic. Awww, Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston are splitting up. That sucks. Who's gonna adopt me now?

posted by Life @ 11:25 PM