Masquerade!

It's been a few years now since I've seen The Phantom of the Opera on stage. For weeks after watching it the first time on broadway in New York City, I had a couple of my favorite tunes from the soundtrack in my head, with visions of myself as the Phantom. I can say "been there, done that, bought the t-shirt" quite literally, and twice!

A couple of months ago, I happened across a teaser trailer for the now released movie adaptation. The chills I experienced and remembered quite well, came back to me instantly, and I've been humming its tunes off and on since. Tonight, I got my chance to experience the magic once again. "Magic, you say?" Abso-freakin-lutely!!
For the last 24 hours I haven't been able to get the song "Masquerade" out of my head. I'm even humming it now! My soul was ready for this, and had been for awhile.

So, the movie unfolded. Every line, every note, and every word was sucked in like a vaccuum in my head and heart. You may think that I've gone overboard with this, and maybe I have... so what? It's just that good!

Anyway, the movie was fantastic! Scenery was incredible! The cast did a great job, and I was impressed with most of their voices. The Phantom himself vocally was ok, but I thought he could've been stronger. Visually, aside from the great makeup FX done for the face distortion, I expected the actor to be more... how do you say... ah yes... masculine? Not sure if that was right, but nevertheless, he did an ok job.

For those of you that have seen it... is it me or has Raoul always look like such a doof? Maybe this time it was his hair (not bashing long hair because that would just be criticizing my own kind) or something else, but every time his character is shown, he's never anyone that I would root for. Maybe it's because the Phantom is just so frickin cool!

So all of that to say, I loved the movie! Go see it! You'll thank me for it! I gave it an A all around! Great job Joel Schumacher!