Amazing 70s Rock Opera

When I say amazing 70s rock opera musical, the first thing that comes to mind is probably this:

You might even conjure up ideas of this if you happen to be an aficionado of 70s rock opera musicals:

Oh you poor, poor person. When I said amazing 70s rock opera, what I really meant was amazingly weird 70s rock opera. Sorry about the bait and switch, but bear with me, this should be… interesting….

Back in the 50s and into the early 60s, musical movies were all the rage. Huge names like Elvis, James Dean, and even the Beatles were participating in cranking out fun, but campy musical experiences for audiences to enjoy.Interestingly, the timeline of musical movies parallels somewhat the existential timeline of disaster films. I guess we were just really into spectacle way back in the day no matter what form it took.

Much like disaster films, musicals started to see a decline in popularity as the decades wore on. Even potential heavy hitters like Hello Dolly!, based on the hit stage play, and Star!, featuring Julie Andrews, failed to generate profit by the end of the 60s, and so by the 70s, the trend was winding down. That’s not to say that the genre didn’t have a few more tricks up its sleeve, but the wave had crested and was definitely dying.

The 70s represented a time when our sensibilities in film were undergoing a major change. Gone were the days of camp and glitz. In the 70s, people started seeing films that were more real, had deep rooted themes, and that forewent the lighthearted romp for the often dark psychological exploration of the human condition. What I’m trying to say is that the 70s were a weird time for film. Movies were at a point where they needed reinvention in order to thrive, and that definitely showed. Instead of spaghetti westerns starring chiseled-jawed heartthrobs fighting a definite evil, you now got grizzled anti-heroes who worked mostly outside the law, and sometimes you couldn’t really decide who was the bad guy.

Now that we’ve taken a look at the landscape, let’s get back to it. In case you hadn’t surmised by yet, we’re not looking at Rocky Horror Picture Show. We’re not even looking at Hai. No, today we’re looking at the half baked cousin of these and other 70s movie musicals, The Phantom of the Paradise. I promise, I’m not trying to torture you here. But having just watched it, I have to ask myself, “What did I just watch?”

Aren’t we off to a good start? So as the title might vaguely suggest, Paradise is loosely based on the novel Le Fantome de l’Opera. I point that out because this movie came out in 1974, which is a number of years before the the musical stage play debuted. That said, the story centers on Winslow Leechy, who becomes the titular phantom. Winslow writes a cantata and about a man named Faust who sells his soul to the devil to be the best magician in the world. Let me stop here. This is the plot of the film, sort of, so this aspect of foreshadowing is so blatant that it’s just silly. Okay, let’s continue. There’s a megastar music producer who calls himself Swan who steals Winslow’s music and decides to use it to open his club, the Paradise, hence the title.

Still with me? Good. So Winslow meets a young woman named Phoenix who is auditioning to be in his cantata and he’s trying to meet with Swan. This meeting sparks romantic feelings on Winslow’s behalf towards Phoenix. Since I’m doing the summary, we’ll montage a little. Swan gets Winslow put in jail, Sing Sing of all places because this movie has no shame, and Winslow’s teeth are pulled out in some sort of experiment, which answers the question of where Jared Leto go the idea:

Winslow hears that Swan is producing his cantata using a blatant Beatles knock off and breaks out of *Sigh…* Sing Sing. He breaks into Swan’s record pressing factory and destroys a bunch of stuff. In the process, he gets caught in the record press and half of his face gets severely burned because this is a reimagining of the other story, after all. Then after being presumed dead, Winslow sneaks into the titular Paradise, dons a weird costume and proceeds to blow up the Beatles rip off band. They do somehow survive though. Fast forwarding a little, Swan talks Winslow into rewriting the cantata for Phoenix, and Winslow agrees. He’s locked in a room with a super sweet, probably, Moog modular synthesizer, where he rewrites everything. Surprise, surprise Swan had no intention of letting Phoenix star in the show and instead contracts Beef, a blatant Meatloaf rip off to do it instead.

Once Winslow finishes the music, Swan steals the final bits from him while Winslow is sleeping. Swan has a brick wall built over the door to Winslow’s Moog dungeon, and everything appears to be going to Swan’s plan. Ugh. Winslow breaks out, eventually kills *not* Meatloaf, and Phoenix finishes performing the show opening night. Swan signs a contract with Phoenix and she’s promised that she’ll perform the show for the rest of her life. Anyway, Swan wants more freedom so he plots to have Phoenix assassinated during some sort of to do. Winslow, in the meantime, finds out that Swan sold his soul to the devil in order to be young forever because why not? Winslow burns the contract, releasing Swan from it and taking away his immortality. Winslow then thwarts the assassination attempt, and Swan is killed in the process. Due to a suicide attempt earlier, Winslow also dies, and that’s more or less the end of it.

Okay, that was a little painful. However, it’s not all bad. This movie made zero sense a lot of the time. It was really weird. There were some odd uses of split screen, some disorienting set design choices, and some unfortunate use of audio phaser technology. There were also some really interesting set design choices though. Despite a lot of failings, I still managed to enjoy a number of aspects of this movie, especially working in the music business. There great allegory going on with the Phoenix character, who allows herself to be seduced by the attention and the promises of fame that she receives. Swan is an excellent representation of big business music as he wants everything you are without owing any compensation. The entire movie in itself could even be seen as a metaphor for how disco tried to wreck music. Sorry, but it kind of did. This is substantiated by a surprisingly good score, written by Paul Williams, who is pretty prolific. Look him up.

Along the positive side of things, there is a decent variety of musical styles represented in the movie, and the movie does have some fun poking these various genres in a time when Led Zeppelin, Ozzy Osbourne, and the like were changing the face of music. There are also good, somewhat honest portrayals of the music industry at the time, and types of hazards that came with working in that industry. It all makes for a mostly enjoyable watch that often leaves you scratching your head. It’s worth noting that this movie was directed by Brian de Palma. If you don’t recognize the name off the bat, you will recognize some his work, which includes: Carrie,Scarface, The Untouchables, Mission: Impossible, and The Black Dahlia. He’s got a great track record, and that may have saved the initial ideas behind this movie, but sadly, there are definite issues, like as were mentioned before, but also, the acting can be flat at times, and the spectacle can be a little too over the top. I’m not going to recommend you see this one unless you’re already a fan of the genre, and I am sorry about the bait and switch earlier. Perhaps I’ll actually review Rocky Horror Picture Show some time in the future to make it up to you. In the meantime, we’re a mere two weeks away from the official 50th anniversary of the release of the first episode of Star Trek, and I’ve got a month long event planned that should be a treat so stay tuned!