Leroux's novel vs 2004 movie

I always had a hard time understanding how Christine could have feelings for the Phantom in the movie. As said, she was 7, had just lost her father. But it wasn't until recently that I connected his feelings for her. A little creepy for sure. An interesting phan fic, but you're right.....NC-17 for sure

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One thing I thought about....the whole how to dress thing. I assume he figured that out by watching the men that came to the opera. And since going to the opera was a formal affair.....n'est-ce pas?

I know there are people that are just born intelligent, good genes and all. And that people can be self taught to accomplish great things. But unless he had something to teach himself, not gonna work too well. The library theory sounds good. My first thought was, why would an opera have a library with those types of books (architect, design, what have you), but, if it's also a dormitory, than maybe it's not that far fetched afterall. But I must say.....his interior design? Not so genius. Now, Gerry could come decorate my room any day

Even if Erik learned a lot from reading books from an vast library, some things still need hands on experience. Who gave him the idea of extorting money from the managers? Mme Giry? This would account for him to have the means to buy the clothes, but in those days, all was tailor made. How did he find a tailor to comply with this? Interesting.

Architecture needs hands on experience. Unless the book had detailed pics, so does design. Interesting.

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Maybe at nineteen Erik hadn't fallen in love with Christine until she started to grow up and mature, but it is a bit odd. I still go for the Leroux version for being realistic and not questionable.

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Another thing that bothered me in most film versions of Phantom is the mob scene. How could they easily find Erik's lair when he lives in a maze, a labrynth? That still floors me. I know they want more drama at the end of the film, but really now...a maze is not easy to follow if you don't want to get lost.

I agree with you on the book knowledge. You can only learn so much from books. Many areas need hands on experience, including those that you mentioned. I believe I read in a phan fic perhaps that Erik took clothing from the costume department. In Leroux's novel we know he leaves his lair, so he could technically go shopping. In the movie, doesn't seem like he's ever left.

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The mob scene does bother me, but then so does Raoul finding the lair so quickly as well. Mind you, he had the little burp of the water trap, but he still found them pretty quickly after everything went down. Leroux's novel shows us how bloody crazy those cellars are, and even the Persian, who had been following Erik and knew some of his secrets, still manages to get trapped in the torture chamber. Just not likely that first Raoul, then an angry mob (led by Meg, who disobeyed her mothers orders to stay up top!). Not too likely, but Hollywood loves mob scenes. I just thank goodness that the Phantom got away. I would hate to have seen what the mob may have done to him!

Had any film shown the Phantom shopping, taking Christine out for a ride, or any other details like this, they would have been too long, maybe even boring.

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If you would hate to see what the mob would have done to the Phantom had they caught him, wait until you see the silent version. Interesting, very interesting!

I liked this ending better when he gets away, too. Again mob scenes are always good for the drama. Meg's intense desire to know who coached Christine dictated her disobedience.

In many ways, she wished the Phantom had come to her. Secretly, she had a crush on him despite the rumors of him being responsible for selected deaths and accidents. Here is a lead in for another Phan fic which I know at least one has post such, Erik/Meg story. What would have happened the two had gotten together? What would Mme Giry think? The little blonde angel and the Angel of Music?

I am jumping in on this thread because I need an editing brain break-- forgive me if this point was brought up already...

But the shifting of the dates in the movie annoyed me. Paris was not a happy time between 1870-1871. Not. Happy. At. All...

That just made my brain explode.

*slinking away to sip her mocha and edit*

Hehe.....I'm just having the funniest image of Erik shopping at Walmart

Each day more and more I realize that I need to see this silent film. It appears that they got a lot right in regards to the novel. I'm scared now to see what this mob scene does though. Poor, unhappy Erik!

Interesting idea of a Meg/Erik relationship. I always knew that she had secretly wished he had come to her, but I never thought of it as her having a crush on him. But it totally fits. I don't think Mme Giry would be too impressed, especially considering the age difference but I could be wrong.

As for the date change, I'll admit that I don't know a whole lot about that era, so it never occurred to me that the dates would seem inaccurate. Since I'm having a bit of a brain fart here.....what year is the novel set at?

Leroux does not give specific date, yet says: The events do not
date more than thirty years back.

Not more than...

So the reader can think this happened, 10, 15, 9, 30 years prior to the time Leroux wrote his serial which was 1910. Most novels set the dates at about 1880-1881. Looking at the original novel in terms of style, class differences etc you can pin point the dates to be in the '80's.

The Franco-Prussia war ran from July of 1870 to May of 1871 and the Paris Commune was a result of the uprising after the war. I believe Webber opens his film in late 1871... he mentions the "new year" later in Masquerade. Regardless--historically Paris was a time of discontent for the aristocracy and government as a whole durin the 1870's.

And Erik is Walmart.... just made my brain go boom! >wink<

Mav

I suppose Leroux decided not to give an exact date just to keep things a little mysterious. By doing so, it leaves an air of mystery around the story, making it less like a newspaper article and more like a mystery novel. I have no problem with him doing this. There are always things that we will have questions about, that only Leroux could have answered. And I think it's not a bad idea to leave some things left open, keeps the reader guessing. Some novels tell you everything right from the start, and sometimes it's good, sometimes it causes you to figure out the ending well before the end. I like to be kept guessing. That's one thing I like about ALW's stage performance and movie......it leaves the ending open (now we know why, cause he's thinking sequel), but it makes it fun.....we can speculate and wonder. Look at all the phanfics that have come from it. That's just what I think, maybe I'm way off base!

You're right. It does make you think and guess. Sometimes that's good.

When I finished a Phan Phic on another forum, I left it with an open ending and the readers were going to kill me. I wouldn't tell which suitor the leading character chose. My ending went, "...that my friend is another story." *friendly lynch mob*

If you had written the novel instead of Leroux, what woould you have put in or left out?

Wow.....that's a loaded question about what I would include in the novel had I written it. I know a lot of the trivia that we have discussed here in the forums, some of which we have simply agreed to disagree, would have been nice to have answers about them. I wish we knew more about Erik's childhood. We know from the Persian basically what happened in Persia, but I would like to have known more about his parents, his birth, him as a young child, that kind of stuff. Can you picture the awkward teenage years? Lol. Just me...I love background info.

How about you? What would you have included had you had the option?

This question can only be answered with respect to whether or not the information was accessible and if I as the author deemed it important to progress the story at hand.

With respect to the events with occurred in the Opera House with Christine, Erik's childhood really had no bearing on it. We feel like it would because we have hashed over the events and have grown interested in the sorted past of the man in question.

As an investigative reporter, the only real thing that progressed the incident with the young diva was what we see from the Persian. Certainly, Erik's illness and hideous looks bring many questions to mind, but when you get down to brass tacks, it didn't really matter. The story was about the obsessive love between beauty and the beast.

I know most of the stuff that I would want included in the novel is background info and not pertinent to the story. I know we received what information we needed to forward the story and to make sense. But like I said, I love background info, and wish we could know more about Erik's past. It's hard for me to look at the novel and imagine including anything else in it. I know different storylines that I could imagine, but nothing to do with the actual story itself. I am currently reading "The Phantom of Manhattan" and I'm reading it with an open mind. I went into it the way I wish the movie was looked at....as a movie in and of itself. I'm reading the book as such, a book. But the preface was really hard to take with Forsythe bashing Leroux. That kind of irritated me!

The Leroux bashing was the beginning of Phans not liking the book. As you read on, you will see what we mean. It's very difficult to look at his story as a sequel to a story as unique and heart-rending as Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera.

When you complete The Phantom of Manhattan, let us all know how you feel about it. If my mind was anymore open, I really would be losing some marbles...

Lol....aren't we all losing some marbles now and then? I know I am I found it really hard to get through that preface. How are you writing a book based on The Phantom of the Opera, but yet you bash the author who wrote it. Without the original, Forsythe wouldn't have a novel. I'm keeping an open mind. I'm not too far into it yet, so far it's not too bad, but I know it will get worse! When I get frustrated, I'll simply throw the book in the corner and put the movie on

Here's a bit of comparison of movie to novel.

When the Phantom is taking Christine to his lair, he places her on a black horse for a while. This is not part of the show, but is a nod to the original book, where the Phantom uses a horse named Cesar to transport Christine part of the way.

At the end of the Masquerade scene, Raoul briefly enters a circular chamber full of mirrors. This is a reference to the original Phantom of the Opera novel, in which the Phantom used the mirrored chamber as a torture chamber to drive victims insane.

The instruction to "Keep your hand at the level of your eyes" is another reference from the book, in which the Phantom was adept at disposing of victims with the
"Punjab lasso." Keeping one's hand at the level of one's eyes kept the Punjab lasso away from the victim's neck and was the only defense.

Just this morning (since I was awake at 4:30am for no apparent reason) I put in disc 2 of the special edition dvd. I've seen it before, but it's still so interesting to watch. Most people assume that the movie is solely based on ALW's stage performance. But you're are right, there are many references to the original book. And that's awesome. And there are many different things between them all, different things that ALW didn't feel were necessary to his vision of the story, and some things that couldn't be done on stage were done in the movie. The one difference that still bothers me is the chandelier crash. I know why they changed it, but to me it should still be at the end of act 1. Tis the tale of movie makers!

Mmm, the chandelier again. You're not going get pass this any way soon, huh?

Here's a some chandelier trivia that might please you, or not:

In the original stage production the chandelier is dropped at the end of the first act (just after the reprise of "All I Ask of You"), but it was decided to have it at the end of the film. This change has been incorporated into the new Vegas
production of the show.

(When I see it again in February 2009, this may have changed in the Los Angeles version as well.)

The chandelier weighed 2.2 tons, cost $1.3 million, and was provided by Swarovski. It had a stunt double for riskier scenes. There was also a third chandelier made, that was equipped with electricity and lighting for the opening scene.

Because the chandelier scene is at the end of the film, as opposed to ending the first act as it does in the play, one of the lines in the song "Masquerade" had to be altered so that instead of referring to a "new chandelier" they talk of "friends that are here".

The chandelier used was 17 feet high and 13.2 feet wide, and was hung with more than 20,000 full cut Swarovski crystal pendants. It was produced by Tisserant in Paris, and it took four months to construct and five days to assemble at the studio.

I'm a bit of a purest at heart. My introduction to Phantom was through Colm Wilkinson and Rebecca Caine's stage performance. I've had the soundtrack since then (that was probably close to 15 years ago now). I know why the chandelier drop was changed. I understand that, and I believe for the film it was a good decision. It's still just weird to me. I did not know however, that the Vegas show had changed that. Interesting. I did know about the chandelier's construction though. I found it for my mom, as she's collected Swarovski crystals for years!

Well, you see there are some things you know and some are new. Personally, I didn't know the stats on the chandelier.

I found a lot of changes comparing the stage version with the 2004 film, but I stopped thinking about it. I'm just stoked to see it again. Whoo hoo!

I know what you mean about the differences. Similarities, differences, we could go on forever. I know myself I would desperately love to see the stage performance again, since I'm having a hard time with a lot of the details. You are soooo lucky!

Here's a bit of the movie which gives a nod to the novel:
The part where Raoul nearly drowns is also a nod to the original novel, where Erik (The Phantom) floods the torture chamber with water from the lake after Christine agrees
to marry him.

Even though in the Andrew Lloyd Webber version the Phantom doesn't have a name, in the original book he's called Erik.

Who was considered for the role of Christine before Emmy was chosen?

Keira Knightley auditioned for the role of Christine Daaé.
Charlotte Church and 'Anne Hathaway' were considered for the role of Christine Daaé.

That's one thing that I've always stuck with. In ALW's musical and movie, it's the Phantom, not Erik. Maybe I'm being stubborn, but that's me, right? Lol. I knew about Anne Hathaway auditioning, but I would have found that weird to see her in that role, and I have many of her movies!

Didn't Anne Hathaway play in "Ella Enchanted" and "The Devil Wears Prada"? She's too old and too skinny to play Christine.

See, you knew about her auditioning for the part and I didn't. You had one up on me.

True, ALW never used the name Erik for his Phantom. He just called him the Phantom.

I agree with you that Anne Hathaway would not have been right for the part of Christine. Curious why ALW never gave his Phantom a name.

OMG.....the silent film version is awesome!!!! Thank you so much Fay! Talk about a brutal ending though!

Glad you enjoyed the silent version. Now you will understand what is being said when we talk about it. Remember I told you about the Hollywood mob scenes. In those days, it was the way to finish a horror film, send the mob with torches and pitch forks.

Did you notice the similarities it had with the novel? Erik's coffin, the alarm to notify him someone approached his home, the siren,the scorpion and the grasshopper, the barrels of gunpowder, and of course, the Persian. Now you've seen the only Phantom film with the Persian in it. Did you see that his name was Ledoux?

Other than what I mentioned, what else did you find in the silent film that was also in the original?