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The Phantom of the Opera (2004 film)

The Phantom of the Opera is a 2004 musical romantic drama film based on Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical of the same name, which in turn is based on the 1910 French novel Le Fantôme de l'Opéra by Gaston Leroux. Produced and co-written by Lloyd Webber and directed by Joel Schumacher, it stars Gerard Butler in the title role, with Emmy Rossum, Patrick Wilson, Miranda Richardson, Minnie Driver, Simon Callow, Ciarán Hinds, Victor McGuire, and Jennifer Ellison in supporting roles.

The Phantom of the Opera

  • December 10, 2004 (2004-12-10) (United Kingdom)
  • December 22, 2004 (2004-12-22) (United States)

143 minutes[2]

  • United Kingdom
  • United States

English

$70–80 million[1][3]

$154.6 million[1]

The film was announced in 1989, although production did not start until 2002 due to Lloyd Webber's divorce and Schumacher's busy career. It was shot entirely at Pinewood Studios, with scenery created with miniatures and computer graphics. Rossum, Wilson and Driver had singing experience, but Butler had none and was provided with music lessons prior to filming. The Phantom of the Opera grossed $154.6 million worldwide. It received mixed reviews from critics, with praise for the visuals and acting, particularly the performances of Butler, Wilson, and Rossum, but criticism towards the writing, direction and unnecessary deviations from the stage version.

Plot[edit]

In 1919, a public auction is held to clear a dilapidated Parisian opera house's vaults. Among the attendees is the elderly Count Raoul de Chagny, who bids against Madame Giry, the retired ballet instructor of the theatre, for a papier-mâché music box shaped like a barrel organ with the figure of a cymbal-playing monkey, attached to it. The auctioneer then presents a repaired chandelier, relating it to "the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera". As it is hoisted up to the roof, the story moves back to 1870.


The theatre prepares for the performance of the grand opera Hannibal, headed by a soprano, Carlotta Giudicelli. One of the dancers, Christine Daaé, recognizes Viscount Raoul de Chagny as a childhood sweetheart and wonders if he will also acknowledge her, but he leaves without seeing her. Theatre manager Monsieur Lefèvre plans to retire, leaving the theatre under the ownership of Richard Firmin and Gilles André, who introduce their patron, the young Raoul.


Carlotta refuses to perform after being tormented for three years by the theatre's resident "Opera Ghost", a mysterious figure said to live in the catacombs below. Facing the performance's cancellation, Madame Giry suggests that Christine be the lead actress. Christine displays her singing talent and is a massive success on opening night.


Christine tells her best friend Meg, Giry's daughter, that she is being coached by a tutor she calls the "Angel of Music". Christine reunites with Raoul, in whom she confides that she has been visited by the Angel of Music her deceased father promised he would send her after his death. Raoul, however, dismisses Christine's story. That night, the masked Opera Ghost, better known as the "Phantom", appears before Christine in the mirror in her dressing room and leads her away to his underground lair. After the Phantom shows Christine a mannequin of her dressed in a wedding dress he made for her, Christine faints and sleeps in the Phantom's lair. This point presumes that Christine has been missing.


Once Christine awakes and sees the Phantom, she removes his mask out of curiosity. The Phantom reacts violently and covers his face with his hand. After the duo has a moment of understanding, Christine returns the front to the Phantom, and the latter then returns her to the theatre unharmed but orders the managers to make her the lead in Il Muto. However, the managers choose Carlotta instead. During the performance, the Phantom switches Carlotta's throat spray, causing her to sing out of tune, and Christine replaces her. The Phantom encounters stagehand Joseph Buquet and hangs him above the stage. Christine and Raoul flee to the roof, declaring their love for each other. The Phantom, now heartbroken after witnessing the whole scene, vows revenge.


Three months later, in 1871, Christine and Raoul announce their engagement at a New Year masquerade ball. The Phantom crashes the ball and orders his own opera, Don Juan Triumphant, to be performed. Upon seeing Christine's engagement ring, the Phantom steals it and flees, pursued by Raoul, but Giry stops him. Giry explains that when she was younger, she met the Phantom, a deformed young boy, billed in a freak show and abused by the owner. When the Phantom rebelled and strangled the owner to death, Giry helped him evade the resulting mob and hid him within the opera house. The next day, Christine visits her father's tomb with the Phantom posing as his spirit to win her back, but Raoul intervenes.


Raoul and the managers plan to capture the Phantom during his opera. The Phantom murders the lead tenor, Ubaldo Piangi, and takes his place to sing with Christine. Christine unmasks the Phantom during their passionate duet, revealing his deformity to the horrified audience. The Phantom then abducts Christine and retreats as he causes the chandelier to crash and sets the opera house on fire to cover his tracks, but a mob, aided by the gathered authorities, forms to hunt him down. Giry leads Raoul to the Phantom's lair to rescue Christine, while Meg also leads the mob.


The Phantom has Christine wear the wedding dress and proposes marriage. Christine tries to reason with him by admitting that she does not fear his appearance, but rather his malicious actions. When Raoul arrives, the Phantom threatens to murder him unless Christine weds him. Her heart going out the Phantom, Christine kisses him. Moved by her compassion, the Phantom allows the lovers to leave. Comforted by the music box, the Phantom weeps alone and Christine lets him keep her engagement ring as a memento. He then escapes before the mob arrives, with Meg finding only his discarded mask.


Back in the present, Raoul visits the recently deceased Christine's grave and places the Phantom's music box before it. Before leaving, he notices a freshly laid rose with Christine's ring on its stem, implying that the Phantom is still alive and will always love her.

as The Phantom

Gerard Butler

as Christine Daaé

Emmy Rossum

as Raoul de Chagny

Patrick Wilson

as Madame Giry

Miranda Richardson

Minnie Driver

Margaret Preece

as Gilles André

Simon Callow

as Richard Firmin

Ciarán Hinds

as Ubaldo Piangi

Victor McGuire

as Meg Giry

Jennifer Ellison

as Monsieur Reyer

Murray Melvin

as Joseph Buquet

Kevin McNally

as Monsieur Lefèvre

James Fleet

as Gustave Daaé

Ramin Karimloo

as Auctioneer

Paul Brooke

Production[edit]

Development[edit]

Warner Bros. purchased the film rights to The Phantom of the Opera in early 1989, granting Andrew Lloyd Webber total artistic control.[4] Despite interest from A-list directors, Lloyd Webber and Warner Bros. instantly hired Joel Schumacher to direct; Lloyd Webber had been impressed with Schumacher's use of music in The Lost Boys.[5] The duo wrote the screenplay that same year,[5] while Michael Crawford and Sarah Brightman were cast to reprise their roles from the original stage production. Filming was set to begin at Pinewood Studios in England in July 1990, under a $25 million budget.[6]


However, the start date was pushed to November 1990 at both Babelsberg Studios in Potsdam, Germany and Barrandov Studios in Prague, Czech Republic.[7] Production for The Phantom of the Opera was stalled with Lloyd Webber and Brightman's divorce.[4] "Everything got tied up in settlements", Schumacher reflected. "Then my career took off and I was really busy."[8] As a result, The Phantom of the Opera languished in development limbo for Warner Bros. throughout the 1990s.[9] In February 1997, Schumacher considered returning, but eventually dropped out in favour of Batman Unchained, Runaway Jury and Dreamgirls.[10] The studio was keen to cast John Travolta for the lead role,[11] but also held discussions with Antonio Banderas,[12] who undertook vocal preparation and sang the role of the Phantom in the TV special Andrew Lloyd Webber: The Royal Albert Hall Celebration.[13]


Schumacher and Lloyd Webber restarted development for The Phantom of the Opera in December 2002.[5] It was then announced in January 2003 that Lloyd Webber's Really Useful Group had purchased the film rights from Warner Bros. in an attempt to produce The Phantom of the Opera independently.[13] As a result, Lloyd Webber invested $6 million of his own money.[14] The Phantom of the Opera was produced on an $80 million budget.[3] Warner Bros. was given a first-look deal for distribution; when the principal cast was chosen in June 2003, Warner Bros. paid under $8 million to acquire the North American distribution rights.[15][3]

Casting[edit]

Hugh Jackman was among those considered for the role of Phantom, but he faced scheduling conflicts with Van Helsing. "They rang to ask about my availability", Jackman explained in an April 2003 interview, "probably about 20 other actors as well. I wasn't available, unfortunately. So, that was a bummer."[16] "We needed somebody who has a bit of rock and roll sensibility in him", Andrew Lloyd Webber explained. "He's got to be a bit rough, a bit dangerous; not a conventional singer. Christine is attracted to the Phantom because he's the right side of danger."[5] Director Joel Schumacher had been impressed with Gerard Butler's performance in Dracula 2000.[17] Prior to his audition, Butler had no professional singing experience and had only taken four voice lessons before singing "The Music of the Night" for Lloyd Webber.[4]


Katie Holmes, who began working with a vocal coach, was the front-runner for Christine Daaé in March 2003.[18] She was later replaced by Anne Hathaway, a classically trained soprano, in 2004. However, Hathaway dropped out of the role because the production schedule of the film overlapped with The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, which she was contractually obligated to make.[19][20] Hathaway was then replaced with Emmy Rossum. The actress modeled the relationship between the Phantom and Christine after Suzanne Farrell and George Balanchine.[14] Patrick Wilson was cast as Raoul based on his previous Broadway theatre career.[21] For the role of Carlotta, Minnie Driver devised an over-the-top, camp performance as the egotistical prima donna. Despite also lacking singing experience, Ciarán Hinds was cast by Schumacher as Richard Firmin; the two had previously worked together on Veronica Guerin.[5] Ramin Karimloo, who later played the Phantom as well as Raoul on London's West End, briefly appears as the portrait of Gustave Daaé, Christine's father.

Filming[edit]

Principal photography lasted from 15 September 2003 to 15 January 2004. The film was shot entirely using eight sound stages at Pinewood Studios,[22] where, on the Pinewood backlot, the bottom half exterior of the opera was constructed. The top half was implemented using a combination of computer-generated imagery (CGI) and a scale model created by Cinesite. The surrounding Paris skyline for "All I Ask of You" was entirely composed of matte paintings.[5] Cinesite also created a miniature falling chandelier, since a life-size model was too big for the actual set.[23]


Production designer Anthony D. G. Pratt was influenced by French architect Charles Garnier, designer of the original Paris opera house, as well as Edgar Degas, John Singer Sargent, Gustave Caillebotte, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Schumacher was inspired by Jean Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast (1946), where a hallway is lined with arms holding candelabra. The cemetery was based on the Père Lachaise and Montparnasse.[24] Costume designer Alexandra Byrne utilized a limited black, white, gold and silver color palette for the Masquerade ball in spite of the lyrics indicating that it is a multicolored affair in which mauve, puce, green, and yellow are some of the colors worn by attendees.[5]

Reception[edit]

Release[edit]

The Phantom of the Opera was released in the United Kingdom on 10 December 2004 and the United States on 22 December 2004. With a limited release of 622 theaters, it opened at tenth place at the weekend box office, grossing $6.3 million across five days.[25] After expanding to 907 screens on 14 January 2005[26] the film obtained the 9th spot at the box office,[27] which it retained during its 1,511 screens wide release on 21 January 2005.[28][29] The total domestic gross was $51.2 million. With a further $107 million earned internationally, The Phantom of the Opera reached a worldwide total of $154.6 million.[1] A few foreign markets were particularly successful,[30] such as Japan, where the film's ¥4.20 billion ($35 million) gross stood as the 6th most successful foreign film and 9th overall of the year.[31][32] The United Kingdom and South Korea both had over $10 million in receipts, with $17.5 million and $11.9 million, respectively.[1][33]

Accolades[edit]

Anthony Pratt and Celia Bobak were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Art Direction, as was John Mathieson for Best Cinematography. However, both categories were awarded to The Aviator. Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Charles Hart were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song ("Learn to Be Lonely") but lost to "Al otro lado del río" from The Motorcycle Diaries.[34] The song was also nominated for the Golden Globe but it lost to Alfie's "Old Habits Die Hard". In the same ceremony, Emmy Rossum was nominated for Best Actress in a Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, losing to Annette Bening in Being Julia.[35] At the Saturn Awards, Rossum won for Best Performance by a Younger Actor,[36] while The Phantom of the Opera was nominated for Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film and Alexandra Byrne was nominated for Costume Design.[37]

The Phantom of the Opera (2004 soundtrack)

(writer), Joel Schumacher (director) (2005). "The Making of The Phantom of the Opera". The Phantom of the Opera (DVD). Warner Home Video.

Andrew Lloyd Webber

at IMDb

The Phantom of the Opera

at the TCM Movie Database

The Phantom of the Opera

at Box Office Mojo

The Phantom of the Opera

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The Phantom of the Opera

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The Phantom of the Opera