If Minnie Driver sang "Learn to be Lovely" and came out with an album this year, why don't they use her singing voice in the movie? [Because her voice is ill-equipped for the vocal demands of Carlotta's role.]
The Phantom of the Opera (2004) - 46 questions
Directed by Joel Schumacher, starring Ciarán Hinds, Emmy Rossum, Gerard Butler, Minnie Driver, Miranda Richardson, Patrick Wilson, Jennifer Ellison
The "questions" section is for any random questions that occurred to you while watching this film, or anything you didn't entirely understand, and which Google or the IMDb can't help with. Submit them as a question, and hopefully someone will answer (the bold comments in brackets) - check back regularly. If the answer is wrong, or missing information, please use the "clarify answer" option. Don't feel limited - want to know what music played in a certain scene? Whether this was the first film to use a certain effect? Here's the place to ask!
If Minnie Driver sang "Learn to be Lovely" and came out with an album this year, why don't they use her singing voice in the movie? [Because her voice is ill-equipped for the vocal demands of Carlotta's role.] Perhaps an opera aficionado could help me with this one. During Il Muto, we see the story of a count and countess. But when we are taken to the ballet from act three, the ballet doesn't seem to go along with the opera. Is this common in opera and why, or was it a director's decision? [What we see of Il Muto is the very beginning of Act 1. The ballet they switch to is somewhere in Act 3, so a lot of stuff happened in between that we don't know about, so the story might have taken us to a forest at some point, similar to "A Midsummer Night's Dream."] A friend and I were talking about the movie and about how Masquerade has a deeper meaning than just a party. She then tried to convince me that the phantom wrote all three operas based on how he was feeling. I think that the phantom only wrote Don Juan. Can someone enlighten me? [The phantom only wrote Don Juan, the others are just being performed by the characters. The film takes place over a year and it is set in an opera house that needs to make money, so they put on other operas. The phantom tries to have input into the staging of the operas and enjoys watching them, but has not written all of them.] Answered by em At the beginning of the movie, during the auction, when the chandelier rises, the seats in the opera house are dusty. At the end of the movie, it is seen that the seats burn when the chandelier falls. Is this a mistake, or did they rebuild the opera house after the accident? [Considering the fact that nearly 50 years have passed between both sets of events, it is conceivable that the Opera House could have been rebuilt, at least partially, at some point before being abandoned for good.] Answered by Sereenie Why do they sometimes put "La" in front of Carlotta's name? I'm sure it's something to do with the Italian/Spanish language but I took the class a long time ago. [It is a common practice to refer to an operatic diva as La During "Think of Me", the camera goes down into the cellars and we get our first look at the Phantom. Can anyone see what he is doing? [He is merely listening to Christine singing, enjoying her triumph.] Answered by Sereenie I'm very confused about the opening scene with Raoul and Madame (Meg?) Giry at the auction. Which one is it? Meg or Madame Giry? At one point on the corrections page for this movie it says that it is indeed Meg, yet on the questions page it says that it is Madame Giry. Is there any absolute idea to who it is? [It is Meg Giry. If she never married, ahe would keep her maiden name and would be adressed as 'Madam' Giry when she got older. The elder Madam Giry is at least 20 years older than Raoul, and the woman at the auction does not look like a 95-year old.] Answered by Twotall Is Il Muto an actual opera? I rather enjoyed it and thought I would try to see it. [No. Andrew Lloyd Webber created it for his show's purposes.] Answered by Sereenie I am curious what that round thing is during the Think of Me sequence. When the camera goes down through the grate to get to the phantom below the stage, It is on the floor right next to the grate. It looks like an ash tray but I am not sure. [The large gold round object is definately an ashtray, as you can see the cigarettes in it. The smaller black round object looks to me like an inkwell.] I've always been bothered by the pronunciation of Raoul's name. Based on the spelling, I would have thought that it would be pronounced "Ra-ool", but for the most part in the movie, it's pronounced "Ral" (like 'Ralph' without the 'ph'). Which way is correct? [It all depends on the native language and dialectual region of the person with the name. In Spanish, the name would be RA ool, but in other regions, it's rowl, ral, and other things. As another example, Ralph is pronounce rAfe in many regions.] Answered by Myridon Where can I find some hand held fans like the ones used in Masquerade? I'm pretty sure they don't sell them in regular department stores, like Wal-Mart or something, but I can't think of where to look. [They have them at Party City. try other party goods stores or costume shops.] Does anyone know why the deleted scene in the DVD was cut from the release? [Because it only slowed the action down without bringing anything new to the plot.] Answered by Sereenie Why does Christine give the Phantom her engagement ring just before she leaves? [She wanted to leave him something of hers to keep, and it's the only personal item she had on hand.] Answered by Sereenie What's the deal with Phantom's magical lasso? One of the actors talks about it. What is this magical lasso, and did Phantom ever use it? [It's what he uses to kill Buquet, and what he tried to strangle Raoul with at the end.] Answered by Sereenie How, in the scene before the ballet (the one where Christine acted as a page) did Phantom manage to make Charlotte croak? [He switched her "throat mist" for his own concoction.] Answered by Sereenie
I know the story about how Andrew Lloyd Webber had planned to adapt his original musical to film with Sarah Brightman and Michael Crawford in their original roles, but then Webber and Brightman divorced and things never panned out. But now after all these years, why didn't Joel Shumacher contact Sarah Brightman and/or Michael Crawford to do the film? It seems they were meant to play the leads. If I do recall, Michael Crawford had been contacted but declined. Can somebody shed some light? [Schumacher wanted young, up-and-coming actors to play the roles. Brightman and (especially) Crawford were too old for his taste. Besides, Christine is supposed to be a very young lady; a middle-aged Brightman would have been laughable at best seen up close.] Answered by Sereenie Who is the old lady at the auction with Raoul? I thought it was Madame Giry because that is what the announcer called her but the age doesn't make sense so I thought that it might be her daughter, Meg. Anyone have the answer? [It is Madame Giry. She looks as old as Raoul because she had a fit and healthy life. Raoul has become frail, and aged badly.] How old is the Phantom supposed to be? When we are shown his childhood, he looks as though he should be the same age as Madame Giry, but he only looks like being in his 20s-30s. [In the Susan Kay book, there is a quote in which the Phantom says that he is "old enough to be Christine's father", which would make sense, given that Mme. Giry is like a mother to her, and Mme. Giry and the Phantom seem to be close in age. Joel Schumacher wanted to go with a "younger, sexier" cast, but the age difference still seems to work - Emmy Rossum (Christine) was seventeen at the time of filming, while Gerard Butler (Phantom) was about thirty-seven.] When Christine is in the graveyard, why does the Phantom try to lure her into what I think is her father's grave? What would he have done to her? [The Phantom tries to lure Christine to the grave because it is the first time in three months that she has been away from Raoul long enough. It's basically his only opportunity to lure her back to his lair in order to seduce her once more.] Toward the end of the movie, why does Christine kiss the Phantom if she has decided to be with Raoul? Does this mean she had changed her mind to be with the Phantom after all? [Christine loves Raoul, but the Phantom will kill Raoul if she refuses to be with him. So she kisses the Phantom to save Raoul. Then it is the Phantom who changes his mind, he realises how much Christine loves Raoul and that he can't come between them. So he lets them go.]Previous Page • 1 2 3 • Next page
You may also like: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl | Titanic | Iron Man | Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets | Buffy The Vampire Slayer