Present day New York: Aspiring opera singer Christine (Jill Schoelen) finds an outstanding composition by forgotten composer Destler (Robert Englund) and sings it for her audition - where she positively stuns everybody - but is hit by some lighting equipment and knocked out ... and for some reason she is transported back to London 1881, where she is also an aspiring opera singer who has landed a small role in the London Opera's latest production of an opera by Destler, but she has a mysterious mentor who wants her to play the lead - and the mentor is of course Destler himself, who has struck a deal with the devil to make him and his music immortal, but at the price of a horribly disfigured face. And Destler will stop at nothing to get Christine the lead part in his opera, even if that means killing people like diva La Carlotta (Stephanie Lawrence), a critic who was unkind to Christine, and a stagehand who almost killed her in an accident.

Soon enough, Inspector Hawkins (Terence Harvey) and Richard (Alex Hyde-White), co-owner of the opera and Christine's boyfriend, are hot on the trail of Destler, but by that time he has already abducted Christineand taken her to the catacombs beneath the opera where he tries to mold her into a diva by his design - but ultimately Hawking and Richard catch up with Destler and Christine, and after a fight, Destler meets his end in a fire.

Present day New York again: Christine wakes up and learns that she has landed the lead role in the opera. To celebrate the occasion the opera house's patron (Robert Englund) invites her to his home - but Christine recognizes him from her dream, tears off his face and kills him after a fight. Then he destroys his composition so he can never be reborn again ...

The film was made shortly after the premiere of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Phantom of the Opera, obviously to cash in on that show's success - which of course doesn't say anything about the film's inherent qualities. So the question of course remains: Is it (any) good ?

Well, let me put it like that, it's not all bad, the idea with the framing story in present day New York and the main story presented as flashback with effects on the framing story is rather inspired, and the film rises the gore level significantly compared to earlier film versions of the story - on the other hand, the film follows slasher movie (something also inherent in Gaston Leroux's source novel) much closer than any earlier version, and apart from Robert Englund all lead performers are rather bland and uninteresting, the direction lacks inventiveness and personal style and the sets and costumes betray the film's (too) low budget ... so this Phantom of the Opera is certainly not the definite version of the story - but also, it could have been much worse.

review � by Mike Haberfelner

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In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

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starring
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special appearances by
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directed by
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written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

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Robots and rats,
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Tales to Chill
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tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
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Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
the new anthology by
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