Re:Sci-Fi TV/Films that are so bad they’re good
[quote=”stormsweeper”]I TiVo’d a weird Brian de Palma musical recently. [i]Phantom of the Paradise[/i], a rock opera smash-up of [i]Phantom of the Opera[/i] and [i]Faust[/i].
A nerdy music composer (Winslow Leach) has his music, and then his life, stolen from him by an evil record producer (Swan, played by Paul Williams, who also does the music).
High points: Any time Winslow runs about in his [url=http://www.horror-wood.com/paradi17.jpg]fetish-gear[/url] or any scene with the glam/goth rocker Beef
Low points: Swan sitting in a bathtub making a deal with the Devil to stay eternally young and beautiful. This is [url=http://i.imdb.com/Photos/Mptv/1030/11512_0010.jpg]Paul Williams[/url], folks.[/quote]
You left out [i]The Portrait of Dorian Gray[/i], in that Swan ages on film, but stays the same in life. [i]Phantom of the Paradise[/i] is not only one of my favorite Brian DePalma films, but one of my favorite films, period. I love very damn song in the movie (and the representation of various rock music trends — the Sha-Na-Na-inspired ’50s revival of the ’70s in the song/performance of “Goodbye, Eddie, Goodbye”, the [i]Endless Summer[/i]-inspired Beach Boys revival of the ’70s in the song/performance of “Upholstery”, the New York Dolls-ish appearance of the band when Beef is announced at the airport, the KISS/Alice Cooper appearance of the band during “Somebody Super Like You (Beef Construction Song)/Life At Last”), I love Love LOVE Paul Williams as Swan, I love Jessica Harper (who is an extremely nice person in real life), I love Bill Finley as Winslow/The Phantom…I especially love the fact that DePalma COMPLETELY rips off (or, rather, pays homage, since it’s an obvious lift that he’s not trying to pass off as anything else) the opening of Orson Welles’ [i]Touch of Evil[/i] during the “Upholstery” scene — and then ups the ante by doing the sequence in split-screen (my favorite over-the-top cinematic technique), using two cameras running simultaneously with no edits. I don’t think there’s a damned thing in this movie that I *don’t* love. Okay, here’s my only criticism — when the movie was in production, a big deal was made over the fact that Swan’s record label was called “Swan Song” and that Beef dies by being electrocuted on stage. One of the bands on Led Zeppelin’s Swan Song label had a band member who died in a similar fashion (I think), and Peter Grant — Zep’s manager and all-’round tough guy — threatened to sue the pants off everyone involved if they didn’t change the label name. So they replaced (most often optically) all appearances of the Swan Song logo with a “Death Records” logo. There are a few places in which they miss it. There’s a Swan Song logo hanging over the door to the record pressing plant where Winslow suffers a horrible accident, and there are Swan Song logos on banners at the Paradise. There may be more, but I forget. Anyway, sloppy job there (and the optical replacements look sloppy as well).
Cool story from another board — when the movie premiered in NYC (I believe after it had received a pre-release screening), someone went to the trouble of coming up with a Phantom costume to wear at the after-party. It was a hit, so he thought it would be funny to attend a Paul Williams concert dressed in the outfit. So, next time PW came through town, he showed up in the Phantom suit. He milled about the crowd for a while, until Security grabbed him and took him to a hallway somewhere backstage. He figured that he was either about to get kicked out, or get the crap kicked out of him, but from out of nowhere, Paul Williams approaches, comes up to him, and says “Winslow! I’ve been looking for you simply *everywhere.*” Then security let him go back to watch the show.