Leroux's novel vs 2004 movie

I did notice all the similarities with the novel, which is what I liked about it. I did like that the Persian was in it. I really like the Persian, and am glad he was included. One thing I noticed about the movie is that Erik prefers to keep Don Juan private, instead of performing it in public. That was a big change I found from the novel to ALW's version. I also like that Philip was included in this one as well. And this definately takes away any doubt that Erik was responsible to Philips death (not that I questioned it, but he did tell the Persian it was an accident). One interesting addition was Carlotta's mother! I honestly think that this is the first silent film I've watched entirely. And I look forward to watching it again. The addition of Joseph Buquets brother seeking revenge played well into the mob scene.

This was closer to the novel since Leroux was still alive and this being the first film version.

I liked the Persian. Too bad other films did not include him. I recall you believe Erik when he said he didn't kill Philippe, but I say he did, accident or not. When Philippe set off the alarm, this caught him off guard and Erik probably discovered he had done him in when it was too late.

The addition of Carlotta's mother and Buquet's brother was a change, and the fact that silent Erik was an escapee from Devil's Island.

I do like the fact that Leroux had some input on the movie. He could have helped to keep the story close to the original, without making it 6 hours long. I found the Persian to be a really interesting character. One of my favorites in the novel. He's still so shrouded in mystery. Yet he is pivotal in progressing the plot. At first I did believe Erik when he said killing Philippe was an accident, but you convinced me otherwise. I think he killed without realizing who. And I really don't think that killing Raoul's brother should cause him that much regret, save that Philippe had done nothing to Erik personally. I loved that they clearly showed the reed/siren trick. Totally how I pictured it! It's nice that even though they stayed close to the original story, they did add a few details, like Carlotta's mother and Buquet's brother. Also, changing the ending to the horrifying mob scene, but as you said, that was Hollywood at the time. And yes, Devil's island. That was an interesting twist!

Another difference in the silent film and the novel is Erik's handwriting. It looked so neat and legible. Even in the 2004 version it's such good handwriting. Remember, Leroux said Erik wrote in red ink and that it was much like a child's writing.

Just my opinion, but making Erik a Devil's Island escapee took away a lot of the mystique of the Phantom. It made he look like an ordinary insane criminal and Erik was far from ordinary.

I did say interesting, not necessarily that I agreed with it. I believe that Raoul was right in the 2004 film that "genius has turned to madness". But I don't believe that Erik was insane to start with. And I don't like the word insane here, it doesn't seem to fit. Obsessive madness perhaps. I did think that it was an interesting twist though, as it seems out of left field. Maybe that was an easy way to give the viewer some background as to his mental state. Accurate, maybe not.

I never thought about the handwriting in comparison. I always noticed that in the 2004 film, his handwriting is overly neat. I forgot that Erik wrote very childlike and in red ink. I suppose that regardless of how vast a library could be that he could gain his education from, without help it would be hard to develop his handwriting skills.

One other thing about the silent film was his mask. To me this was much more true to the novel. The only part that was weird was the bottom that moved when he talked, like a sort of veil. Just weird. But I loved the red death costume. That's exactly how I picture it in my head. But Gerry still makes one fine red death!

You can call it whatever you want. Poor unhappy Erik was not all here mentally after awhile. I'm sure you're right. This was the only quick way to justify Erik's behavior.

When I first saw the silent film, that was one of the things I noticed, his handwriting. Also, did you realize silent Erik signed the note "the Phantom". In the novel he signed it O.G.

Indeed, the mask was something else. It looked odd to me. However, the Red Death was exactly the way the book described him. Of course, I agree, Gerry's Red Death truly stimulates the harmones.

I never clued in to the fact that in the silent film Erik signed as The Phantom instead of O.G. Interesting. I loved Red Death. One thing that seemed weird to me though was on the rooftop, as he listened to Christine and Raoul, he took off his Red Death mask. I suppose that had to do with us being able to see his emotions perhaps? Definately a scarier looking Phantom than Gerry was. Ahhh, Gerry

This was what really made the Phantom in the silent film, Lon Chaney's makeup. You do know he created the Phantom makeup and didn't want any publicity photos of him as such until after the movie's release. This intensified the curiosity and anticipation. This marketing ploy worked and everyone in the community flocked to see this mysterious Phantom of the Opera.

The scene upon the roof was different, especially compared to Patrick Wilson and Emmy Rossum. Lon Chaney was scary and of course cannot be compared to a hottie like Gerry.

With the way Chaney looked and can see why Christine freaked out. You're right, his mask was totally odd with that frilly fabric covering his mouth.

I didn't know about Lon Chaney's makeup and stuff. I did know that he was in demand for this movie, and he was good at the "monster" character. If I'm not mistaken, he was doing "Hunchback" when they first wanted to do Phantom. I can just imagine how the crowd in the 20's would have reacted to the Phantom.

It totally makes more sense in the silent movie that Christine was scared of Erik. It wasn't a small deformity like Gerik's. Although, in the 2004 film, Christine doesn't really seem as scared. She's more pitying, yet on the rooftop she does seem more scared. But I think at that point it's less about the physical terror and more about the emotional terror.

The mask is weird. With the kind of hat too. But that piece of fabric that moved when he talked was just creepy. And it's funny.....to me Lon Chaney didn't look so much deformed as he did just horribly ugly. Tell me, what exactly is the story behind Devil's island? I know Erik escaped from there, and he was viewed as insane, but I honestly don't know the story behind it.

Devil's Island was a penal colony off the coast of French Guiana from 1852 to 1946. It harbored hardened criminals guilty of murder and theft. The living conditions were deplorable and disease infested. In 1938 the French government stopped sending prisoners to Devil's Island, and in 1952 the prison closed forever. Very few, if any, actually escaped from Île du Diable.

This is why this prison was chosen. Knowing what Île du Diable was, the audience would then begin shivering in their boots.

Hope this helps.

Oooh, that does add to the story, doesn't it? That would make for a more interesting story! I can just imagine the look on people's faces when they read that!

Sometimes silent films had more going for it than modern ones. Nowadays we rely on high tech special effects, lots of sex, violence and very little writing, let alone good writing.

Silent films made the actors express themselves, that's why we see exaggeration of gestures and facial expressions, but none the less, some good writing. Because of his exceptional talent as a makeup artist as well as an actor, Lon Chaney became known as the "Man of a Thousand Faces". In the early days of Hollywood, background artists or extras had to stand around stage doors waiting to be called. Obviously, Chaney got tons of work because of his versatility. This led to his fame and call to play the very first Phantom of the Opera.

Whatever we saw written had to progress the plot and character development. Not one word is wasted as we commonly see nowadays. Just the name Devil's Island, brought shivers to anyone regardless of whether or not they knew what it was. See how cleverly Carl Laemmle tucked in the words Devil's Island and criminally insane.

Even the creepiness of the mask and his weird actions scared the daylights out of you. With Lon Chaney, we see nothing romantic and nothing to suggest a love story. All we see is 'horror'. No wonder all these years the genre of the famed story was considered 'horror' and not 'high romance'. I'm sure any female who watched this film in 1925 did not look at Chaney's Phantom as a dream, more like a nightmare.

However, with the thought that Erik was a hideous, insane murderer, we really don't see his true genius or feel any sympathy for him. I know I didn't, nor did the mob.

It's true that in silent films, nothing is wasted. Each action, each word is necessary and furthers the plot. It is definately different from what it is today.

In the novel, and in the silent movie, there is no emphasis on the love story part. You still see that Erik loves Christine, but it is not emphasized. It is a horror story, first and foremost. ALW was the one that really put the emphasis on the high romance. I still found that I felt sympathy for the Phantom, but that's just me. And I totally felt the mob took it too far, but that's just me. I often find sympathy for the antagonist.

Here is a little something I found, author Unknown, but it makes you think and perhaps inspires.

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The history of the Paris Opera House research revealed five interesting topics. First, an attempted assassination of Napoleon III and the Empress Eugene took place as their carriage passed through the rue Lepeletier after an evening at the Opera. The incident prompted the Emperor to offer a competition to design a new opera house.

In 1860, Charles Garnier entered the design contest called the Ministry of Fine Arts and won. The construction of the Opera House was funded by the state. Due to many unforeseen problems and the Franco Prussian war, the construction stopped in 1870. After the war, the working class occupied the unfinished opera house and used it as a warehouse, observation post, communications center, military post and a powder store. The project was finally finished in 1875, fourteen years later. When the emperor and empress were presented with the model, they asked "What is this style? It's not a style. It's not Greek, it's not Louis XVI." Charles Garnier was noted to have replied, "No, those styles have had their day. This style is Napoleon III, and you complain?"

Second, Gaston Louis Alfred Leroux, a writer, was moved by the grand architecture of the Opera House. With permission, Leroux explored the outer parts, including the cellar which at one time was used as a torture chamber, the basement which gave him access to the underground lake and many hidden passages.

When the Opera House was finished, it was one of the largest venues in the world. The stage was built with 118,404 square feet, 11,000 in square meters, that allowed space for 450 players. It was 185 feet high, 568 feet long, and 333 feet wide. The main chandelier weighed six and a half tons. It took 13 painters, 73 sculptors, and 14 plasterers and stucco specialists to complete the artwork. The Opera's cellar was built on top of an underground lake and stream.

An unexpected accident occurred in 1896 in the Paris Opera House. One of the counterweights of the chandelier fell from the ceiling killing one opera patron. This event sparked Leroux's imagination and inspired him to write the novel, the Phantom of the Opera.

The Phantom of the Opera is a popular horror romance that describes the end of a ghost's love story. In Leroux's novel, he claimed the ghost did exist and was not based on his imagination. The first Phantom of the Opera was published in 1910 and the first film premier took place in the San Francisco Curran Theatre in 1925.

Third, Claude Debussy was quoted as saying, "To the uninformed passer by", the Opera looks like a railway station...inside one might be forgiven for thinking it was the central lounge of a Turkish bath."

Fourth, in 1875, the opening night of the Opera consisted of pieces from the dead. The pieces included overtures by Rossini and Auber. This program was designed to avoid offending living composers.

Fifth, a bit of trivia regarding German history. German writers did not have copyright protection. In 1842, Hambury Stadttheater attempted to introduce a system of royalties. Next year, Meyerbeer managed to set up a system at the Berlin Opera which allowed authors to receive .10 cents off the performance ticket. Music prose were being sold from 500 to 2000 francs. For example, Leon Pillet, director of the Paris Grand Opera paid 500 francs for the prose works of the Hollander, while Lachner paid Henri de Saint-Georges 2,000 francs for the Catarina Cornaro.

That was really informative, thanks Fay! I love how much my brain has expanded since I've been on this site.

Thanks for the info Fay! I never get tired of learning more about POTO!!!

Thank you snowmoccasin and Gabby81.

With information like this, we begin to form our own opinions of whether or not the Phantom existed as told by Leroux.

I don't know if anyone realized where the novel opened and closed. Perhaps I should save that as part of a quiz or trivia question. Or not.

Here is part of an article from The Australian:

The sound of Nellie Melba's voice emerging from the vaults of the Paris Opera comes with a whiff of necromancy: a summoning of the famous soprano's sonic ghost.

A century-old recording of Dame Nellie Melba has been retrieved from a Paris Opera time capsule.

Or it could just be the echo of a century-old marketing ploy.

On Christmas Eve, 1907, the Paris Opera dedicated two urns containing 24 pristine gramophone records of the great singers of the day.

The voices of tenor Enrico Caruso and sopranos Emma Calve, Adelina Patti and Melba, among others, were sealed in a time capsule: a lasting tribute to their vocal artistry.

The ceremony of the "buried voices'' at the Palais Garnier opera house would, in part, inspire Gaston Leroux, who wrote his famous novel The Phantom of the Opera in 1909.

In Leroux's story, workers unearth the skeleton of Erik, his disfigured "angel of music'', as they are burying the records. The novel opens and closes in the sound vault.

The urns were exhumed and opened last year; the recordings contained therein were digitized, and this week made public on the internet.

If you click here you can listen to some of those recordings.
here.

This quiz does compare the book to the novel in a way, so give it a try.


Question 1: Which of the following in the movie, Broadway show, and book?

a. all of them happened

b. Piangi falling off the elephant

c. Carlotta's croaking

d. none of them ever happened

e. the swordfight


Question 2: In which version does the Phantom crawl upon the ground?

a. the movie

b. the book

c. the book and the Broadway show

d. the Broadway show

e. He never crawls on the ground!


Question 3: In which version does Firmin say "Mystery of soprano's flight! Mystified, all the papers say."

a. all of them

b. Broadway show

c. book

d. When was this?

e. movie

Question 4: Which version specifies a blonde Christine?

a. A blonde Christine? Does that mean I can be Christine?

b. Broadway script

c. book

d. movie script


Question 5: In how many versions does a horse appear?

a. all three

b. one

c. two (book and Broadway)

d. two (movie and Broadway)


Question 6: In the Broadway show, who has to be told how to sing "tan-" in order to complete the phrase, "Those who tangle with Don Juan"?

a. Christine

b. Raoul

c. Carlotta

d. Piangi

e. Erik


Question 7: In the book, what brother of Raoul's turned up dead near the lake?

a. Antoine

b. Louis

c. Erik

d. Philippe

e. nobody turned up dead



Question 8: In the movie, in which order do Raoul, Christine, and the Phantom mention the ordering of a carriage or fine horses?

a. Horses? Carriages? We're in the 21st century!

b. Phantom, Christine, Raoul

c. Christine, Phantom, Raoul

d. Raoul, Christine, Phantom

e. Christine, Raoul, Phantom


Question 9: Madame Giry is:

a. All of below

b. in cahoots with the Phantom

c. Meg's mother

d. the ballet master


Question 10: According to Madame Giry's tale, in either version, the Phantom should be:

a. admitted into a mental institution

b. very famous if he'd only go into show biz

c. older than Meg and Christine

c. younger than Meg and Christine

d. hung

So, I'm not making excuses here, but it has been at least 15 years since I've seen the stage performance. And stupidly, I think the treatments erased some of the book. But I'm going to do my best

1 - C - Carlotta's croaking
2 - C - He never crawls on the ground (that would be beneath him, but it's probably wrong!)
3 - E - Movie
4 - C - book
5 - A - all three
6 - D - Piangi
7 - D - Philippe
8 - D - Raoul, Christine, Phantom (drew a total blank on this one)
9 - A - all of below
10 - C - older than Meg and Christine

Please....no laughing

Beautiful! You got them all correct but #2, which should be c. the book and the Broadway show.

You remember in the book when Erik crawled away from Christine after he shouted at her and then felt bad. Here is the quote: "He had let go of me at last and was dragging himself about on the floor, uttering terrible sobs. And then he crawled away like a snake, went into his room, closed the door and left me alone to my reflections...

Brava! You did much better than me. I only got half of them right. You beat me.
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This time no quiz. Let's discuss symbolism in the story both the novel and the 2004 film version.

Both are filled with such throughout the entire story. Let's start with one at a time.

Box 5 has a number of symbols, such as the number 5 and perhaps it's location. What made this box so special? Why couldn't he have chosen a different one?

First of all we know the Phantom lived five cellars beneath the Opera House and there is a five pointed star in a pentacle or pentagram, whichever reference you prefer. We also know this box had a hollow column which allowed Erik to come and go without being seen. What else?

I know in the movie that box 5 is the closest on that side to the stage. If he is having to hide, then the closer to the stage would be best so he could see what's going on. How do we know that not all the boxes have the hollow columns? Would they not all be the same design? An interesting note on the number 5...though you mentioned the 5 pointed pentagram, which is often associated with satanism, in Judeo-Christian terms it also represents the holy spirit, as well as the 5 books of Moses. You mentioned that Erik lived 5 cellars under the opera house, which could refer to a sort of hell, Erik representing a sort of devil. We know that Erik felt like he was in hell, that he was condemned by his deformity.I will admit that I'm not great with symbolism. I can often pick our religious symbolism, but when it comes to stuff like numbers and such, I don't have much information on it.

You made some good points. The religious symbols you mentioned I'm not familiar with, however, well done.

Erik did refer to himself as an Angel from hell and thus lived in hell (beneath the Opera House). Depending on what the five books of Moses contain, not sure how they apply. Perhaps you can enlighten us.

The musical staff has five lines, while some roses have five petals.

In my opinion, the Phantom did not have all the boxes fixed with a hollow column. Box 5 was special. According the 2004 film, he'd lived in the Opera House most of his life and probably felt as if he ruled that box, if not the Opera House and Christine. This might represent his throne and when Raoul occupied it, the Phantom took deep offense and so Buquet paid the price for that and his infernal snooping.

Raoul threatened Erik's authority and power not just with Christine, but as patron of the arts, not to mention flawless looks and clothes. We see this in the comment where he calls Raoul 'a slave of fashion'.

I guess where I was mislead was that Erik fitted box 5 with a hollow column. I thought maybe that's how they were made, but now that I think of it in those times, they would likely have been solid, not hollow.

The five books of Moses are the first 5 books of the bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. They tell the story of how the earth came to be, the original sins and struggles of man, as well as giving the 10 commandements for how we are to live.

I agree 110% that the Phantom took it as a personal insult to have Raoul in his box. Although the Phantom is a bit of a hypocrite. He judged Raoul on his looks, without knowing anything about him, exactly how he wishes he was not judged. I wonder if that thought ever crossed his mind?

Not sure if the five books of Moses fits in the scheme of Phantomology. The ten commandments don't, that's for sure.

You are absolutely right. Erik did judge Raoul in the very same way he didn't want to be judged.

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Let's turn to the rose for a moment. It's beautiful, delicate, but if not handled properly it can give great pain, and may even draw blood.

Christine carried the rose to the roof top only to drop it in the cold snow when Raoul proposed marriage. The Phantom views this as rejection and crush its petals, probably pricking his fingers on the thorns in the bargain, again a symbol of unrequited love. Some say heartbreak is the fate worse than death.

In the 2004 film we find yet another meaning for the rose; each time the Phantom give one to Christine, he's saying 'my passion burns for you, but if rejected, can cause great pain'. Because of this rose, both of them caused each other pain. Yet in the end, the Phantom place a rose on Christine's grave along with the ring to say, 'my love for you is still eternal, no matter how much pain you inflict on me. You will always be mine, forever!'

The rose has always been a symbol of beauty, but also of danger. You are right, handled the wrong way, and the rose can't hurt you. One of my favorite songs is Poison's "Every Rose Has It's Thorns", which is fitting. What relationship isn't like a rose. No relationship is perfect, we often hurt the ones we love. Christine and the Phantom both do things that hurt each other, but they obviously love each other. I find the final rose with the ring so symbolic, that though Christine has passed, and Raoul is ailing, the Phantom lives on.