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| Claude
Rains, Nelson Eddy, Susanna Foster, Edgar Barrier |
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Anamorphic
widescreen |
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Dolby Digital
5.1 |
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DTS |
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Trailer(s) |
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Featurette(s) |
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Documentary |
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Audio commentary
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Deleted scenes
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Concept art
/ storyboards |
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Multi-angle
feature |
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Claudin (Claude Rains): You
know I'll not harm you, don't you? How could I harm you? I've always
helped you, haven't I?
Christine (Susanna Foster): Yes.
Claudin: Yes what?
Christine: Yes, you've always helped me.
A disfigured musician terrorizes the
Paris opera house.
 Long
before Andrew Lloyd Webber turned this tale of romantic and musical
obsession into the long-running Broadway musical, Phantom of
the Opera was one of film studio Universal's reliable stand-bys,
wheeled out for a new production successfully every ten or twenty
years. B far the best adaptation was the 1925 silent version, featuring
Lon Chaney's legendary make-up and its inventive use of color in
key sequences.
The 1943 version, with Claude Rains as the Phantom, boasts solid
production values, but lacks the excitement or suspense of the earlier
film. The narrative is rather slackly rold, with bizarrely extended
opera sequences and bland, flat lighting necessary to accomodate
the three-strip Technicolor process used at the time. Unfortunately,
there simply isn't anything very frightening about a cloaked figure
running around through brightly lit opera hallways. Only in the
last reel do we finally get a glimpse of the cavernous dungeon sets
that are the only elements in the film that convincingly emanate
the Universal horror movie atmosphere. But even with the film's
strong finale, Claude Rains' rather flat playing of the Phantom
role makes the connection to the other classic horror films slim
at best. |
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The eight movies that were selected
as Universal's 'Classic Monster Collection' were released on Region
1 DVD some years ago, but have since gone out of print and have
been put on moratorium by Universal, awaiting a re-release.
These same eight titles were recently released on DVD for Region
2 and 4, available both separately and as part of an eight-disc
box set. The R2/4 release of Dracula doesn't include the
Spanish version of the film, but otherwise there are no major differences
with the original Region 1 versions.
The fullscreen image is framed
at its original aspect ratio of approx. 1.33:1. This early Technicolor
production boasts solid colors with deep, full reds and reasonably
accurate skintones, and is marred only bu a softness to the image
that blurs details and truly tells the film's age. Green and white
specks on the print are also numerous, but fortunately there is
very little in the way of scratches or débris.
The mono sound mix is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0, with a general
lack of dynamic range most fully apparent during the extensive opera
sequences, which tend to sound muted and flat.
The extras on this release thankfully
more than make up for the slightly bland version of the film found
on-board. The 50-minute documentary hosted by film historian
Scott MacQueen does an outstanding job of telling the story not
only of this production, but of the earlier version as well and
the film's Hammer-produced second remake. It includes generous footage
from numerous other Universal pictures and is both hugely entertaining
and highly informative. MacQueen also provides an excellent audio
commentary trackwith more detailed scene-specific background
on all aspects of the production and itspey personnel. It's a dense,
fast-moving and information-packed track that even rewards a second
listen. An animated image gallery consisting of poster designs
and promotional stills, accompanied by cues from the score. The
theatrical trailer rounds out rounds out these formidable
extras. The static main menu screen is accompanied
by a music cue from the score. Navigation is simple and uncluttered.
Dan
Hassler-Forest
Reviewed:
2002
Click
here for IMDB info on Phantom
of the Opera.
Click here
to return to the front page.
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