``The Phantom'' is one of the best-looking movies in any genre Ihave ever seen. I suppose people don't go to the movies just to drink inthe production design, but here is a movie that would reward a visit bysomeone who loves art but is indifferent to adventure movies andcomic-book superheroes. It uses the visual materials of 1930s pulpfiction, adds a touch of film noir, and paints everything in a paletteof reds, browns, golden yellows, creams, greens, blacks--and purples, ofcourse.

The movie is also smashingly entertaining on the story level. ThePhantom, created in 1936 by Lee Falk, is said to be the first of thesuperheroes, and the movie is true to his origins. He doesn't have theabsurd powers of Superman or the catlike grace of Batman, and when helands on the hood of a speeding truck, the film doesn't do it with alight pounce, but with a heavy thud, as of muscle meeting metal.

Although he's known to those who fear him as ``The Ghost WhoWalks,'' he isn't immortal; he's the 21st in a line of Phantoms, whotrace their heritage back to the first Phantom's vow to fight evil andpiracy. (How the Phantoms have found 20 brides willing to live in theSkull Cave is a question not answered in this film.) The film stars Billy Zane as the Phantom, a.k.a. mild-manneredKit Walker. His fury is roused when an evil industrialist named XanderDrax (Treat Williams) schemes to bring together three priceless skullsthat, when assembled, will give him power over mankind. Fighting againstDrax's schemes is a heroic newspaper publisher (Bill Smitrovich), whodispatches his niece, Diana Palmer (Kristy Swanson), to the jungle insearch of one of the skulls. Phantom fans of course know Dianeeventually becomes Mrs. Phantom, but here they are meeting again for thefirst time after her college courtship with Kit that ended when hemysteriously disappeared.

The movie's plot is essentially a series of adventure sequences.

There's an aerial dogfight between a Pan American Clipper and two redbiplanes. Two perilous crossings by truck over a disintegratingsuspension bridge. A strangling by skeleton. A chase in which thePhantom and Diane successfully drop from a plane and land on the back ofHero, the white stallion, just before the plane crashes into a mountain.

And a showdown inside an eerie mountain cave, where members of the SinghBrotherhood and Drax battle for the skulls against the Phantom and theforces of good. At the end, as a bonus, there's a really neat miniaturesubmarine.

The director, Simon Wincer, orchestrates these events just a hairthis side of parody. He and Billy Zane find the right tone for thePhantom: bemused, all-knowing, wise, irreverent. ``No smoking in theskull cave,'' he says at one point. And when Diana tries to run theshow: ``Fine, go ahead--it's your rescue.'' The movie's best line issaid by a bad guy from the big city who now finds himself, in brown suitand fedora, inside a menacing jungle cavern: ``Skulls! Powers ofdarkness! This isn't right! I was an altar boy, for the love of Pete, atSt. Timothy's! The only power I believe in comes out of the barrel of agun!'' Zane plays the Phantom as essentially an ordinary, if talented,human who wears a purple suit and an eye-mask (of course Diana can'trecognize him when he's wearing the mask). He often functions as thecalm center of the storm. Treat Williams, as Drax, is implacably evil(he blinds a librarian by hiding spring-loaded needles in a microscope)and also slick and oily in the best pulp tradition. Kristy Swanson(whose ``Buffy the Vampire Slayer'' is a cult favorite) is plucky andathletic as Diana, and develops an intriguing relationship with Sala(Catherine Zeta Jones), Xander's dragon-lady sidekick, who softens andchanges sides.

What all of these people decided, I suppose, was that the greatstrength of ``The Phantom'' was style--which made the classic comicstrips stand out from the crowd, and which might help define the Phantomfranchise for modern audiences (since, let's face it, the Phantom is notas big a name as Batman or Superman). The production design by PaulPeters is tirelessly inventive, but also crucial is the photography byDavid Burr, whose framing creates montages defined like a comic strip.

Burr sometimes uses color and composition in much the same spirit as theGlasgow artist Jack Vettriano, whose flashy gangster types and molls inred dresses regard each other in sullen lust.

``The Phantom'' was written by Jeffrey Boam, who wrote ``IndianaJones and the Last Crusade.'' It has the breakneck energy of the IndianaJones movies, and the same love of fedora hats and very big old trucks.

But it's not Indy in a purple suit. It has its own distinctive tone andfeel, and a certain innocence; the PG rating indicates it's suitable forfamilies, and so it is, because it lacks unnecessary violence andsexuality--but that doesn't mean it's not red-blooded. It's in love witha period when there were islands not on any map, and one or two bravepeople could change history, and characters could shout out, ``Have youheard the exciting news? We're going to the Devil's Vortex!''