Movie: The Phantom of the Opera (Joel Schumacher, 2004)
Opera used to be the domain of the royal courts; bringing it to the people requires Oprah. "You get an aria, you get an aria, EVERYONE GETS AN ARIA!!" If stirring climaxes are the highlight of opera, why not make a show that consists of nothing else? The stage version of The Phantom of The Opera did become the most popular theater production in history, even if, going by this adaptation, all the songs sound pretty much the same. Every single lyric is composed and performed in exactly the same way, building up to a climactic note supposed to give the impression that every single emotion is a powerful one expressed powerfully. And whenever you don't hear a rousing orchestral schore, the music's sole purpose is to ostentatiously build up to it. These principles of overwrought excess also apply to scene composition and set design. Entire scenes play out with the actors in the background, simply because that allows more room to stuff the frame with kitsch. There can never be enough roses, chandeliers, ornaments, gowns, wigs and other symbols of conspicuous wealth on screen, and the audience can never be allowed to feel sold short.
There is probably no Dutch artist who has more succesfully incorporated Andrew Llyod Webber's overblown theatricality in his (live) performances than Marco Borsato. De Toppers are kitschier, but they do it with a wink. Borsato is sincere and would have probably remained on top of the Dutch entertainment world if not for his own personal hubris - he is currently on trial for sexual misconduct. I am not a fan, but I knew what I was getting into and can't complain too much about not liking things I was never going to. But then there is Minnie Driver... My love for Good Will Hunting has been well documented, but Grosse Pointe Blank was an early favorite too, making Driver one of my first celebrity crushes. She is an actress I've always rooted for and been happy to see, but her performance here is embarassingly unwatchable. She plays an Italian self-aggrandising diva everyone wants to run away from. She is supposed to be unsympathetic, but plays to the rafters so much she effectively breaks the fourth wall. It doesn't help that she, like most other relevant characters, is introduced during a meta rehearsal scene. A documentary of the same actors having lunch may in certain instances be preferable over a movie; a documentary of the same actors being petulant irritants definitely isn't.
With the exccption of Simon Callow and Ciaran Hinds, as the profit-driven new opera owners who are too excited about their latest acquisition to fully grasp the implications of a phantom haunting it, all main actors struggle with the suspension of disbelief. That's partly on Schumacher and Webber who treat them too often as nothing but conduits of their pomp. It's hard to reach a meaningful climax without foreplay, but because the film is only interested in the former it takes short cuts turning all songs into exposition dumps. Conveying the deep love expressed by the centerpiece song 'All I Ask Of You', without having shown any scenes of the lovers falling for each other or even meaningfully interacting, requires the actors to have both a natural chemistry and completely uninhibited acting styles, unafraid to show that even the smallest gesture of their partner has an unimaginable effect on them. Patrick Wilson and Emmy Rossum lack it; Sarah Brightman and Cliff Richard have it. There is a video clip on YouTube of them performing All I Ask Of You that's better than anything in this film.
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