Phantom of the Opera (2004) Watch Party

 

Alamo Drafthouse is a Theater chain which is also a restaurant and a culture center. The Alamo Theaters frequently program older films, indies and foreign fare and it would be to say they don't put in an effort to satisfy as many people as possible. This week, they celebrated the 20th anniversary of the film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Phantom of the Opera".  Directed by the man who nearly killed the Batman Franchise with his color palate and costumes with nipples, Joel Schumacher. This was really a fortuitous combination, because Schumacher's sense of style matched up well with the romantic extravagance of the Broadway musical.

This was a watch party, so unlike the strict silence policy usually in place at Alamo, the audience is encouraged to cheer, sing along, shout out quotes when they come up, and generally have a more interactive time. We had a hostess for the party who distributed masks, candles, wristbands and roses with black ribbons as we entered the theater. We were treated to trailers for other versions of this property, including Brian DePalma's film, Clause Rains as the Phantom and even the Phantom of the Mall.  Before our film started, the hostess set up the ground rules and encouraged us to respectfully interact with the film and one another. She also got two fans up to do their best operatic delivery of a line from one of the songs. They both were great. And then the movie began.

I had seen the stage musical several time before the movie had come out. The family had gone twice when the touring company was in Hollywood, so we looked forward to the movie a great deal. It was our family Christmas film in 2004 and we were all pleased with it. That has been up to now the only time I saw it in a theater. This experience justifies a little more attention as I am prone to with a theatrical experience. Of the criticisms I have heard of the film version, the most typical is that Gerard Butler was not as good a fit as many wanted. Watching him in the gritty roles he plays nowadays, it might be hard to imagine him in this romantic musical. He was not a trained singer, but he was effective enough. Christine is supposed to be a singer, the Phantom is a secret tutor. I don't think tutor in singing would automatically be an accomplished vocalist. Also, the Phantom is supposed to have some physical deformities, so his slight imperfection works fine. Butler was young and handsome in the role and it was easy to see the appeal he had in spite of the mask.

There are some structural changes in the story that purists might object to. The chandelier crash occurs at the end of the film rather than at the end of act one. There is an extended swordfight between Raoul and the Phantom that was not in the original production. Finally, fans of the stage musical might be confused by the bookend flashback sequences, which work for a film but would have been complicated on stage. 

On the plus side, the three main leads all do their own singing, only Mini Driver, who actually has trained as a singer, was dubbed. I have to give special attention to actress Emmy Rossum who plays and sings the part of Christine. She was only sixteen when the movie was being shot, and at the risk of seeming a little creepy, I think she is one of the most beautiful women I have seen in a movie. It doesn't hurt that she is in some period lingerie that accentuates her physical beauty. When you hear her sing, the image is complete and we know why the Phantom was obsessed with her. Patrick Wilson, who plays Raoul, is also very young and he looks baby-faced compared to his subsequent film roles. 

Director Schumacher did some nice work setting mood and visualizing a bigger canvas. In the opening, we see the footlights lighting up, as we transition from the sepia tone black and white bookend of the auction, to color as the first performance in the Opera house begins. You can see that moment in the trailer above if you like. The arms holing the wall sconces in the chambers leading to the Phantom's lair are actual human arms that are gold and sway to the melody of the scene. Later, when Raoul is descending through those hallways, the look is gothic, and black grey, which suggests that the Phantom's voice influenced Christine's memory of the trip. This was a nice flourish that feels very much like something Schumacher would do.

If you are not a fan of Lloyd Webber's music, you are noy going to care for this. If however, you are a romantic, and a theater geek, and a horror fan, "The Phantom of the Opera" is excellent. It is best with an audience in a theater to get the ambient sound of the music right. Lucky for me, that is the party I went to last night. 

The Monkey (2025)

 

Okay, I have given writer/director Osgood Perkins two chances now, to show me something worthwhile  in his horror films, he has not passed my smell test. I could tell ten minutes into this film that it was a stinker, but that some people were going to like it. I had almost the exact same reaction to it that I had with "Longlegs". The longer the movie went on, the less I cared about anything that was happening. The only element of this that I can say might work, are the gory deaths, which are shown in plenty of detail to satisfy anyone who only cares about how gruesome something can be. 

Horror movies ought to build suspense or dread. At the very least there should be a couple of jump scares to goose us into paying attention. "The Monkey" has none of those things. The main thing driving this story is the cynicism of the characters, and the depression that every one of the main figures seems to be suffering from. Twin brothers, abandoned by their father, inherit a  wind up toy monkey that appears to be cursed. That appearance is because every time the toy is wound up, when it finishes it's musical performance, someone dies a horrible and grizzly death. No one cares why, no one really talks about it, and the fact that the dad ran away from it seems to suggest that the damage could be controlled is the toy is just left alone. There is a supernatural addendum as well, the toy can reconstruct itself. Whatever.

When the twins are younger, in their early teens, one is a bully and the other is a morose wimp who is bullied not only by his brothers but by a gang of girls, for no reason whatsoever. Once they realize the danger of the toy, it gets used once in an act of revenge that backfires, and subsequently, it randomly kills some others around them. The tone of the film is supposed to be nihilistically comic, but the laughs stopped coming for me early on. I can clearly see where the turning point for me was. A minister, delivering a sermon at a funeral is shown to be a naïf  idiot, for no reason except for an audience reaction, but not the audience in the church, the one in the theater. I was not amused and then spent the rest of the time continuing to be unamused. 

Theo James plays the grown up brothers in the second two thirds of the film. Timid Hal has inexplicably been married, had a child and continued to be a miserable trod upon person. The intervening twenty five years are not explained and what pushes the estrangement of Hal from his son is left up to us to imagine. Supposedly, it was to keep his son free of the curse, but why would he think he needed to do that since they were curse free for two plus decades? Bad Bill seems to want revenge, but why twenty five years go by before he seeks to extract it is also unexplained. All we know is that Bill seems to have started the Monkey curse again, and the people from their small hometown are the ones randomly paying for it. The climax of the film creates a series of grim deaths for multiple random people. In concept, some of those should be funny, but in execution, they just are there without an emotional payoff of any type. 

It is clearly the directors deadpan style that does not work for me. Fans of Jim Jarmusch may like this. It reminded me of his "The Dead Don't Die". Which by the way I also did not care for, but at least it had a point of view. This is an exploitation of cynical gore effects, without a story to back them up. The main characters were unpleasant, the deaths while inventive, were not shocking or scary, they just exist in this snow globe of body parts and viscera. 

Paddington in Peru (2025)

 

This was probably my most anticipated film of 2025. I have been charmed by Paddington in two previous films, both of which I can say are of the utmost quality and have huge entertainment value. While our wonderful title character continues to provide whimsical charisma a plenty, it is not enough to overcome the story foundations of this film. "Paddington in Peru" is the first of these movies that feels completely like a children's film. There is not enough here to sustain love for a long period of time, there is just enough to keep it interesting for it's run time, but that's all.

Maybe the fact that the movie switches from a simple visit back to Peru to see Aunt Lucy, to suddenly becoming a missing bear film with a treasure hunt thrown in, makes it feel contrived rather than clever. We still get the bear out of water moments that made the first two movies so winning, but here they feel a little less natural and manufactured. Paddington manages to get the Brown family to accompany him because of a new boss at Mr. Brown's work, who wants the actuarials of the insurance company to take some risks. My, what a coincidence. The pending empty nest of the Browns is also an incentive to take a journey to the Amazon. 

Once they arrive in South America, we can feel that there is something afoot. The new characters introduced are much too blasé about a missing  bear, and the clues are a little obvious. When we encounter Antonio Banderas as a boat captain for hire, we start to cross the line into silliness. The captain has his own quirks and those become a side show to the main story. Olivia Coleman joins Banderas as the characters doing their best to live up to the standard provided by Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant in the previous movies, but even their combined efforts fall short. This is the storytelling, not the actors fault.

Too many things in the movie just feel random. I know that happened in the other stories too, but there was usually an explanation or a gag that made it fit together. I never felt like it jelled as well with this film. Maybe, with characters like this, you need a stronger story. Tot Story has succeeded four times, because they spent time making a story worth telling rather than a story that simply allows us to continue with the characters. 

"Paddington in Peru" is not a bad movie, but it was a disappointment for me, simply because my expectations were so high. By all means go and see this film, the main character continues to be a delight. Just hold down you expectations and be sure to take some kids with you, they will probably enjoy some of the treasure hunt. 

Hell or High Water (2016) Revisit

 

For my money, this was the best film of 2016. I originally had La La Land in that spot, but every time I see this movie my opinion of it goes up. We went to a screening at Alamo last week, and once again, I appreciated the movie even more. Jeff Bridges and Chris Pine are exemplary, but Ben Foster steals the movie..

I'm not going to write a new review but here are links to the two posts I did on this film in the past. 

Original Post

LAMB Devours the Oscars Post

Captain America: Brave New World (2025)

 

A Brief Video Review of the Anthony Mackie led Captain America film. 

Heart Eyes (2025)

 

This is a rare film that actually did better at the box office it's second week rather than the first week of release. There is only one reason for that, the tie in to Valentine's Day. In fact February 14th was the highest grossing day for the film, almost double the take from the Friday before. People must be desperate for a film that they can share on Valentine's Day, if this is the thing they committed their romantic holiday to. It is not very good. The level of stupidity can be offset just a little bit by attractive casting. 

"Heart Eyes" is a romantic comedy that morphs into a slasher film, in spite of the fact that it starts with a couple of gruesome murders. That is because the murders are so disconnected from anything that we know about this world. The initial couple that we see killed are trying to produce the perfect tick tock video proposal, and you will dislike them immediately. They are self absorbed and controlling, but that doesn't mean they should be murdered or that we should care that they are. The real story starts with a young ad executive who has miscalculated how to promote romance and engagement jewelry, at the wrong time and in the wrong way. We are supposed to see immediately that she is a darling who has just made a mistake and is uncomfortable with her tasks. I see a stereotypical female romantic lead, who is portrayed as clever but makes every silly mistake you can imagine in the first two acts. The meet cute with her rom-com counterpart is actually a nice play on the trope and he is attractively packaged.

The problem is that the psycho killer is stalking couples and they accidentally become one that the killer is focusing on. Because we know nothing about the killer, other than their costume, we have no idea what the motive is or how the killer thinks. We are getting less than half of the usual slasher film here and the romantic comedy stuff gets run over by the repeated attempts on the lives of our two "non-lovers". Once in a while that pays off with a funny bit of business but not consistently.

If the reveal of the killer feels like an anticlimax, that's because it is. There is more to it and we get a stapled on ending in the third act. If you don't feel cheated by the preposterous new reveal, then all I can say to you is I have an extremely rare copy of "Speed" on Laserdisc that I will let go for $200. Look, I'm a horror fan and I forgive a lot of bad storytelling to allow a fright film room to operate in, but this film expects too much of us simply because it centers around a holiday. 

The best "kills" are revealed in the trailer, so save yourself some time, watch that and get your gore fix. Now put on your LED lit goggles and go out and find somebody to share a real movie with. 

Love Hurts (2025)

 

I've put this off for a couple of days, not because I was busy but because I was indifferent. This should be a fun action comedy with a bunch of martial arts fights thrown in. Instead, it is a bunch of martial arts fights in search of something to be fighting about. From the get go, this story makes no sense. How does hiding from your crime boss brother work, when your face is plastered on every bus bench in the city that you both live in? That's not the most mysterious element of the film, why would a woman marked for death, openly court the criminals she has stolen from? If she had a plan, it was never made clear what it was. The arbitrary use of Valentine's cards to troll her former boss and the other criminal gangs is just a justification to open the movie round the Valentine weekend. They get that wrong too. 

Like everyone else, I am enjoying the return of Ke Huy Quan to the on screen movie world. He has a nice presence but he is really a supporting player, not a leading man. His character Marvin is the former enforcer for his brother, but he betrayed him for love. A love that we never see any sign of, we only get exposition that there must be love there somewhere. The comic persona is fine, even the martial arts moves are convincing. It is not however believable that he has transformed from a stone cold killer to a cheery realtor in such a short time.

I'm sorry, but this is the third film I have seen Ariana DeBose in, where she is not good. Maybe the problem is the material, because in "West Side Stoy" she was fine, but in "Argylle", "Kraven" and this, she is terrible. It's as if they cast someone who looks like they might be interesting, but did not follow through to see if it was true. In this film, it is not. Her line deliver is flat, she has no chemistry with Ke Huy Quan, and the part wants us to believe she is the smartest person on the screen, but nothing she does seems clever.

The movie is loaded with hit men who are menacing looking, but mostly inept. The two targets they are after, get away from them over and over again. Two innocent people get killed in the movie, and those deaths are completely superfluous to the story. This movie wants to be "Smoking Aces" or "Bullet Train", but it is bland and unengaging. I did not hate it, but I can't imagine anyone will be saying "you've gotta see this!" The most appealing character in the film is Sean Astin, who has a good guy persona that charms the audience, and we know from the get go, he will be only a side character for a short time.

See it if you have nothing else to do, but see it quickly, because it will not be in theaters for long. Maybe for even less time than the film stays in my memory. 

My Bloody Valentine (1981) Revisit

How some films become cult classics is beyond me. It's obvious that a film like "Rocky Horror Picture Show" was picked up by fans because of the obvious opportunities to participate in the fun. I never understood why "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension" wasn't a hit in the first place, but it makes perfect sense that it is revered now because it's concept and execution are finally recognized. There however is little reason to believe that "My Bloody Valentine" from 1981 will ever be seen as a hidden gem. The remake from a dozen years ago was far superior in every way. How does that happen?

This Canadian film as little going for it, except the title. The production values on the movie are not great, the script is at times preposterous, and frankly the acting is atrocious. I know they were working on a small budget, and the actors are relatively inexperienced, but it never seems like they got a second take to fix things in their original line deliveries. Sometimes the presentation is so wooden you think the movie is a parody of horror slashers. It's not a parody, it's simply not a very good. Maybe the final song and the demented fade out account for whatever credence the film has.

This criticism should be seen as a reason not to see the film. I still enjoyed being in the theaters the other night, sort of experiencing a nostalgic rush of '80s Horror. As long as you don't mind a horror movie that is not particularly frightening, and is not very titillating, then you can enjoy this film. The main thing that it has going for it is that preposterous concept. A crazed miner, rescued from a cave in after surviving by cannibalizing other coworkers while awaiting rescue, became a spree killer. Now 20 years later, it seems that the spree killer has returned, provoked by the Valentine's Day celebrations which ignored the lead up to the disaster two decades earlier. The pickaxe that is used to kill some of the victims is a good concept but it's not visualized in a very interesting way. Which is why the movie fails to satisfy fans of gore. The kills are relatively tame, and most of them lack of jump scare to pull them off. 

I can see what this movie wants to be, and I can also see where it misses the mark on a regular basis. The 2009 3D version at least had the good sense to include an eyeball impaled on the end of the pickaxe, in a 3-d effect. That's a movie that knows what it's supposed to be doing. So for nostalgia and for setting up the concept, "My Bloody Valentine" is adequate, the problem is it never gets to be insane until the last moment when the crazed killer is finally revealed and runs off screaming curses and a vow to kill again. That's sort of the  delivery which could have made this a lot more entertaining.