The Prestige

Review by Loc

The fascination isn’t in the reveal, it’s in the setup. That’s what my magician mentor always said to me. If you can get your audience to believe, to commit to the spectacle you’ve presented, then the pay off will be tremendous. Introduce doubt, introduce disbelief, and your illusion will be nothing more than a cheap parlor trick that drunkards perform at parties. The Prestige, Christopher Nolan’s new flick about turn-off-the-century magicians, is neither good nor bad. It’s a magic trick that you haven’t seen, but nothing that you’ll run home to tell your friends about. In the end, it’s just average, the spectacle isn’t there. Quick hit: the big reveal isn’t all that spectacular, making the trip to get there, sometimes long and tedious.

Story goes like this: Wolverine and Batman are young magicians who end up as life-long rivals. But it’s even more than that, tragedy strikes which spurs on this lifelong obsession, tragedy so fierce that not even Alfred the Butler can squelch it for his young protégés. Man, if they were in costume, this movie would be even better! Alas, Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, and Michael Caine stay in London character and do as little magic possible in a magic movie.

Smart-ass comment or harsh truth? Debatable, but the sleight of hand is not the driving force of this flick. While our main characters focus on one improbable illusion, the main thrust is the obsession of Jackman to outdo his nemesis. Enforcing this notion, Jackman imitates Bale’s impossible trick until Bale retaliates. Back and forth we go, until one man wins, and one man doesn’t. If that’s not vague, I’m just not trying hard enough. But I will say this, any more detail and I’m showing too much of the trick at hand.

The problem with this film is the motivations of the characters. Yes, the rivalry begins from a tragic moment, but the emotional impact isn’t really there. Then when things turn from vengeance to obsession, again, the emotion lacks. Sure, we see everything happening, but it’s almost like the film is telling you this is happening, instead of showing you. Maybe that doesn’t make much sense, bottom line though, the film lacks the depth to create a genuine, engaging story. As a result, the whole movie builds to an interesting discovery, the big reveal as my magician teacher would say, and it’s a nice way to unveil things for sure. However, it’s no Sixth Sense “Bruce Willis was dead?” And that makes it a bit deflating.

Wolverine and Batman are very solid in their performances. Jackman loses his Australian accent once again, ending up speaking with an American-twang that seems a bit out of place if he’s supposed to be in London. Kinda weird when Scarlett Johansen busts out a accent but Jackman doesn’t. The most notable, mind-scratching performance is the actor who turns in his best Nikola Tesla impersonation. Yes, the famous, sometimes infamous, engineer/inventor/physicist plays an important role in this flick. And the actor who plays him, well I never would have guessed it was him. Call it the best magic trick in the whole film, that’s what I consider it.

Overall, this is a pretty dramatic movie, there’s not a whole lot of Lance Burton going on, not a lot of cool tricks revealed in the course of telling the story. And while I haven’t actually said much about the flick, my magician teacher would commend me on the misdirection of having you read through it to get to this point. With less character depth than you might hope for, The Prestige meanders a little bit as it takes it journey. If the point was to explore more of the mystery, than more delving into Tesla’s actual history would have been fascinating. After all, we’ve named the physics unit of magnetic flux measurement after him, but he’s mostly a forgotten man. Yet, this guy was exploring time travel, interdimensional travel, he was delving into the mysteries a full century in advance of our most advanced scientist today. Anyways, it doesn’t do that, so you’re left with a slow unfold of characters driven by something that’s not totally explained. Out of 100 light bulbs, The Prestige illuminates 65 without using a single electric plug. Solid if unspectacular.