Everything about Phantom of the Opera has an epic quality, including the facts and figures which swirl around it. Since the show's London debut in 1986, it has played 110 cities in 20 countries.

It has been seen by some 60 million people, grossing more than £1.6 billion worldwide a unique achievement for a stage show, knocking most blockbuster film statistics into a cocked hat.

To face all this pomp and circumstance must be a daunting prospect for filmmakers but director Joel Schumacher and team have tackled it with verve, style and a sense of fun.

A sepia-toned postcard, depicting turn-of-the century Paris springs to life as we zoom into a faithful replica of the magnificent opera house in Paris, the scene of the story.

The building is sadly derelict and its dusty artefacts are being auctioned off. When the wrecked chandelier lights-up, it floods the gloomy monotone with rich colour, illuminating the theatre in its full glory as we travel back 50 years to its heyday.

When businessmen Andr and Firmin (Simon Callow and Ciaran Hinds) take over Paris' Opera Populaire, they encounter haughty ballet mistress Madam Giry, (Miranda Richardson) foul-tempered prima donna Carlotta (Minnie Driver,) and all sorts of mysterious mishaps and rumours about the Phantom (Gerard Butler.)

Also present is orphaned chorus girl Christine (Emmy Possum) and her aristocratic suitor and childhood sweetheart Raoul (Patrick Wilson.)

When Carlotta flounces out of rehearsals in a huff, it turns out Christine has been taking singing lessons from a mysterious teacher guess who? and plays the leading role to thunderous applause.

Her dark angel of music' whisks her away to his watery candlelit lair, deep below the theatre, to play her the music of the night.

The cinematography constantly strives to distinguish this film from the limits of the stage production.

At one point, from a lofty gargoyle's-eye view of a packed auditorium, we swoop down into the orchestra pit, through a floor grate into the sub-stage machinery, down through a crack in the basement into the dank dripping bowels of the theatre the Phantom's lair.

There is much enjoyment, on and off stage, in the preposterous wigs and frocks, particularly in the opera scenes and the film captures the sheer scale of operations, the cast of hundreds involved in the intricate ballet of people and machinery backstage, complete with horse-powered winches.

The film lacks the original's dark gothic mystery on stage, the Phantom is usually glimpsed in the shadows which makes him all the more menacing and much stagecraft is used to make give him magical powers.

The cast are generally capable and watchable with Minnie Driver giving a surprisingly good turn as the fiery diva.

Gerard Butler's Phantom, when not murdering people does far too much cape-swirling even for this high camp spectacle. At one point he is beaten in a swordfight by Raoul, who spares his life. This is a big mistake. He should be demonic, this leaves him looking sheepish.