Dir: Dario Argento
Argento, never renowned for his coherent screenplays, plumbs new depths of trumpery with this loose and ludicrous adaptation of the classic novel. The Phantom no longer has scars or wears a mask. Instead, it's just Julian Sands looking like a creepy old hippy, sniffing shoes, babbling and stuffing rats down his leather pants for sexual gratification. As Christine, the Phantom's lover, Asia Argento lip syncs badly to opera and strips naked for her father's alarmingly lecherous camera. Meanwhile, throughout the opera house, unutterable nonsense occurs. We have a midget riding atop an oven with wheels, sucking rats up with a home-made vacuum cleaner; two camp Englishmen fussin' and fightin' in a bath-house full of saggy nudists; strange bursts of light and smoke that make people go mad and shred their hands in mousetraps; some overblown and uncharacteristically shoddy gore FX by Sergio Stivaletti (the chandelier massacre sequence is genuinely laughable); dialogue that physically hurts your ears to listen to (ie: "He only has a bout of malaria, it'll be gone in two minutes" / "I was born in the river of space and time and raised by creatures. This is the reason for my double nature."). By the time you get round to a slimy, opium-smoking Raoul slapping up whores for no discernible reason, Gaston Leroux is spinning in his grave even faster than you're reaching for the "STOP" button. Which is pretty damn fast, let me tell you. EL BOMBA!
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