Phantom of the Opera... I think I've fallen in love 0.0 ~♥

I think I may have been in love with it before, but now let's just say that love has been rekindled through watching the videos put up by The Phantom Reviewer on YouTube. Whoever he is, I thank him for that because I found out that I actually really do like old horror stories, such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Frankenstein (I pronounce it F-rawn-ken-schtein, which may be a result of my German classes). I also thank him because it tells me that I do not want to see the version of The Phantom of the Opera that was directed by Dario Argento (ugh... rats....). Despite all the crude humor that there is in it, he's still a great reviewer. :)

Movie Poster

Anyway, I had just finished the old silent The Phantom of the Opera where the actor who played Erik (the Phantom) was Lon Chaney. For a silent film, it had me on my seat with my eyes glued to the screen. It had me excited, scared, and finally like crying (when Erik was "killed" ... he probably was killed in this version).

Lon Chaney as Erik

I was watching it with my sister and she was not used to silent films so I read out the captions to her. I realized that I might be a good at doing drama... yeah... that sounds a little narcissistic. But I'm serious; when I was saying Erik's lines I was yelling and even felt the little tingly feeling in the back of your throat that you feel when you're really angry and yelling at somebody. I felt like crying as Christine called for Raoul in fear for his life and begging Erik to let him go. It kinda makes me want to play Erik in a home-done Phantom of the Opera show. Hm.... that's not a bad idea, actually. I think Grandma Padde would get a kick out of a play made by her grandkids.

The Scarlet Death costume

Continuing on, I have to say that the movie was brilliant. I was watching a version where each scene was colored differently to show the different moods for each part and to add variety in the screen play. The score was excellent (unlike a really bad version where there was drama in the wrong parts) and the humor was still funny for that time period. Lon Chaney's performance and make-up was what really got me impressed -- for that time era the make-up was awesome. They couldn't exactly remove his nose, as Erik in the book does not have a nose, but they still made him look like the corpse-face he was supposed to be. I could really feel what the characters were feeling really well. In short: I liked it a lot! :)

I had bought the book yesterday on Amazon.com and I can't wait for it to come so I can open it up and read it.

I love Erik! Though he does obviously need some serious therapy. Don't tell him I said that though or he might kill me XD