Brian De Palma's "Phantom of the Paradise" is a very busy movie.

Among other things it attempts to be a put-on of "Faust," "The Phantom of the Opera," "The Picture of Dorian Gray," rock music, the rock music industry, rock music movies and horror movies.

The problem is that since all of these things, with the possible exception of "Faust" (and I'm not really sure about "Faust"), already contain elements of self-parody, there isn't much that the outside parodist can do to make the parody seem funnier or more absurd than the originals already are….

Compared with even the last of [De Palma's earlier films,] "Phantom of the Paradise" is an elaborate disaster, full of the kind of facetious humor you might find on bumper stickers and cocktail coasters.

The movie spends much too much time just laying out the plot, which is fatal to parody of any...