History Film / ThePhantomOfTheOpera1925

''Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera'' had its second film adaptation in 1925[[note]]The first adaptation was a German film which has since been lost[[/note]], starring Creator/LonChaney as the eponymous Erik. It is a well-known silent film, and is seen as one of the most faithful adaptations to the original book. It depicts the Phantom as tragic, but also murderous and criminally insane.

This film is a fairly faithful adaptation of the Gaston Leroux novel (except for the ending), so most of the tropes on the Literature page apply here. Tropes particular to the 1925 film are listed below.

* ReCut: A sound version of this film was made in 1929 and released in 1930, with Mary Philbin (Christine) and Norman Kerry (Raoul) reprising their roles in talking scenes, and with other scenes being re-shot. Lon Chaney was under contract to MGM so his scenes were re-used with some voiceover added. The dialogue scenes have since been lost, but the silent version of this 1929-30 recut still survives. The original 1925 edition only exists in an inferior 16mm version, so most home video and presentations use the silent 1929-30 version, which, among other differences, has a different actress playing Carlotta (Virginia Peterson in 1925, Mary Fabian in 1929).

* GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion: Perhaps the earliest well-known example of a movie getting an altered version. After being released silent in 1925, the film was given a sound re-release in 1930; about 60% of the footage was re-shot with sound, and the other 40% had sound dubbed over it. A third version of the movie called the Eastman House Print also exists, but nobody actually knows where it came from or why it exists. It's silent, but it uses footage from the sound version, and features a scene which looks like it was shot with sound but does not appear in the sound version at all. The Eastman House Print is, ironically, the most popular version of the movie due to its extremely high quality and completeness compared to the surviving materials from the other two versions.

* TheFilmOfTheBook: This version revises the ending but is otherwise the most faithful adaptation of the novel. It includes Raoul's brother, who is usually AdaptedOut. It also originally included the Persian--he is shown wearing a fez--but in post-production he was turned into a French police detective. Since it was a silent movie, all they had to do was change the title cards. Chaney's deformed head resembles the "death's head" the book describes, and is a deformity from birth as in the book, unlike most later adaptations in which it is an injury.

->''[[ForbiddenFruit "You are in no peril as long as you do not touch my mask."]]''

It has since fallen in the public domain and may be watched [[http://www.archive.org/details/ThePhantomoftheOpera here]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vElsIYXbhMU here]]. And [[http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Phantom_of_the_Opera/854375?trkid=2361637 on Netflix]], if you have it.

It is grouped in the franchise of [[Franchise/UniversalHorror Universal Monster films]] along with its [[Film/PhantomOfTheOpera1943 1943 remake]]

* DramaticUnmask: Phantom's unmasking is probably the ''most'' dramatic one, and one of the best ever examples of this trope. According to the Website/IMDb, "The sight was said to have caused some patrons at the premiere to faint."
** Creator/RobertBloch wrote about having seen this movie as a child. He didn't follow the plot much, and didn't get why the Phantom was wearing a mask. Then came the dramatic unmasking scene, and he slept the next ten years with lights on.

** Likely a result of a MythologyGag in a PragmaticAdaptation; the Phantom of the book ''is'' missing his nose entirely, but such an effect would have been difficult to pull off with silent movie-era special effects.

* MissingEpisode: A complete cut of the 1925 version was believed to have been lost to time for decades, until the British Film Institute discovered a copy in 2011 and released it on DVD two years later.

It is grouped in the franchise of [[Franchise/UniversalHorror Universal Monster films]] along with it's [[Film/PhantomOfTheOpera1943 1943 remake]]

* GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion: perhaps the earliest well-known example of a movie getting an altered version. After being released silent in 1925, the film was given a sound re-release in 1930; about 60% of the footage was re-shot with sound, and the other 40% had sound dubbed over it. A third version of the movie called the Eastman House Print also exists, but nobody actually knows where it came from or why it exists. It's silent, but it uses footage from the sound version, and features a scene which looks like it was shot with sound but does not appear in the sound version at all. The Eastman House Print is, ironically, the most popular version of the movie due to its extremely high quality and completeness compared to the surviving materials from the other two versions.

It has since fallen in the public domain and may be watched [[http://www.archive.org/details/ThePhantomoftheOpera here]] and [[http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5224364451553593147 here]]. And [[http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Phantom_of_the_Opera/854375?trkid=2361637 on Netflix]], if you have it.

''Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera'' had its second film adaptation in 1925[[note]]The first adaptation was a Russian film which had since been lost in time[[/note]], starring Creator/LonChaney as the eponymous Erik. It is a well-known silent film, and is seen as one of the most faithful adaptations to the original book. It depicts the Phantom as tragic, but also murderous and criminally insane.

* JumpScare: The aforementioned DramaticUnmask scene. Once unmasked, the Phantom stares RIGHT at the camera and jumps to his feat. As mentioned above, this was enough to make people faint during the film's premiere.(This is one of the shots that is different in the re-release and ironically the version often referred to as the classic original scene is usually not.)

* JumpScare: The aforementioned DramaticUnmask scene. Once unmasked, [[http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1mUOhMSI6jU/UJFDB4RzCvI/AAAAAAAACzI/gQ79Akvpwb8/s640/unmasking.gif The Phantom stares RIGHT at the camera, and looks as if he's screaming]]. As mentioned above, this was enough to make people faint during the film's premiere.

* SplashOfColor: Most of the movie is in black and white, except for the masked ball scene, which is presented in early Technicolor.

* DramaticUnmask: Phantom's unmasking is probably the ''most'' dramatic one, and one of the best ever examples of this trope. According to the {{IMDB}}, "The sight was said to have caused some patrons at the premiere to faint."

** RobertBloch wrote about having seen this movie as a child. He didn't follow the plot much, and didn't get why the Phantom was wearing a mask. Then came the dramatic unmasking scene, and he slept the next ten years with lights on.

* DramaticUnmask: OK, it isn't really specific to the 1925 film, but this version's take of the Phantom's unmasking is probably the ''most'' dramatic one, and one of the best ever examples of this trope. According to the {{IMDB}}, "The sight was said to have caused some patrons at the premiere to faint."

* DyingMomentOfAwesome: In the silent film, see BrandishmentBluff above.

* InformedAttribute: In the 1925 film, Joseph Buquet describes the Phantom as having a huge hole in his face where the nose should be, but when the Phantom finally appears, he clearly ''does'' have a nose, albeit a horribly deformed one. Of course, Buquet may be exaggerating.

[[caption-width-right:194:Lon Chaney as Erik in the 1925 film.]]

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