I didn’t much care for the new 2004 Joel Schumacher-directed version of the famous Broadway musical The Phantom of the Opera, but nothing is as dry and joyless as this 1943 version. Dubiously featured in Universal’s Horror Movie Monsters collection, with the phantom character apparently co-existing with such creations as Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Wolf Man, this film is much more opera than anything else the title suggests. Horror? Not so much. I wanted to be swept up in this movie. Instead, I found myself sweeping away the bad taste in my mouth from all the staginess of the material.

Claude Rains, one of the stars of the beloved Casablanca, which came out around this time, does an OK job as the man who turns into the phantom, but mostly the cast is made up of forgettable characters actors. Susanna Foster is especially bland as the female protagonist Christine. The characters don’t really get a chance to flourish because the director seems to be more interested in extended scenes of singing than telling a good story. There’s just not very much forward motion.

It’s all a bummer because I really wanted to love this movie. I saw the Broadway version back in 1999 on a middle school trip to New York and absolutely fell in love with the show. I can’t remember anything specifically I loved about the show, but I remember coming back and having immediate interest in finding out more about the Phantom storyline. I did enjoy the silent 1925 Lon Chaney film, and there were parts to Schumacher’s version that didn’t make me want to vomit, but I was hoping this 1943 version would maybe be the best film version. Nope. The 1925 version still takes that honor.

I want gothic atmosphere to roam the center, the sides, and every corner of the frame of a horror film entitled The Phantom of the Opera. The film is just too bright and colorful. That it won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography is blasphemy. Including it in the Universal Monster collection was a mistake because it promised a kind of movie that isn’t delivered. But even if the expectations weren’t present, I still wouldn’t have cared for this version. It’s way too stagy and features less than two or three moments of actual suspense or terror. I wanted to love the movie, but all I wanted to do after watching the first hour or so was turn it off. I didn’t. But could I have? Sure.