He might've instead demanded a more expensive and better writer to adapt the source material. This thing is almost two and a quarter hours long and the eponymous main attraction is onscreen for maybe a third of the time.
Waaay too much time is spent on less-thrilling social unrest and court intrigue subplots, as well as on the obligatory romance plot (which doesn't actually involve Quasimodo). To be fair this might be a criticism against Hugo - I dunno, I haven't read this novel, though I have read Les Miserables. Hugo wrote that one thirty years after he wrote Hunchback, and his grasp on plotting and incorporating themes seamlessly into his narrative clearly made remarkable strides in those three decades. To be further fair to this film version, I get bored w/ the Disney musical version of Hunchback, too, yet somehow I like the Charles Laughton version (huh, wonder why?
). One clear misstep in the '23 HUNCHBACK is that Don Frollo (who is kind of the most important character) has been split into two less important and undeveloped characters, one purely evil and one purely benign (maybe to avoid trouble from American Catholics...?). This really hobbles the story here.
and, ya' know what? My performance was all the better for it!
No one complained or was confused when Christine pulled off my mask, either.
In this case, I wish Lon had been allowed to do more acting instead of just showing off some shoddy FX.