The Prestige Movie Review
I saw this at a Thursday night screening thanks to my buddy Jeremy. In a nutshell I loved it. Ive been a huge fan of Chris Nolan ever since i first saw Memento. Now this movie cant touch the raw awesomeness of that movie, but this is my favorite of his since. Im not the biggest fan of Batman Returns but i had more of a problem with the script and not the directing. The movie ran for 2hrs 15 min but i dont think i ever looked down at my watch once. Even though some of it was predictable it still had me transfixed to the screen wanting to know what was going to come next. The acting of course was spot on by Christian Bale, Hugh Jackman, Michael Caine, David Bowie and others. Im a fan of the current magician resurgance with Criss Angel and David Blaine leading the way, so right off the bat i was already curious to see what it was about. I had only seen a few previews so i didnt really know what to expect.
To break it down without spoiling too much the movie is about two young magicians Rupert (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred (Christian Bale) and their battle to get revenge and outdo each other. The movie starts off with Rubert dying and Alfred on trial for the death of him. In a flashback very early in the movie in a trick gone wrong Rupert's wife who is an assistant to the head magician dies in an accident thats partly the fault of Alfred. This is when the start of their rivalry begins. Rubert is a better showman than Alfred, but Alfred seems to be the better magician overall. Michael Caine's character cutter is an assistant to Rubert and helps him invent different contraptions to help with the magic show. Another great performance by Michael and he looks sharp enough to act for another 20 years at least. So they basically go back and forth getting revenge on each other. One day Alfred comes up with an amazing transporting trick. Rupert is stupified and obsessed in finding out how he does it.
While all this is going on the movie is covering three different time frames. 1. Present day with Alfred on trial for the death of Rubert 2. the beginning of their career and rivalry and 3. in the middle time frame with Rupert in search of the ultimate magic trick. The great thing about the movie is goes through all 3 of these time periods without being confusing in the least bit. Not one time was i wondering what part of the movie it was. Thats the basic story without giving away much more than you would find in any synopsis online. There are 2 major twists and one of them i figured out about 2/3rds of the way through and the second twist is hinted at but i wasnt able to catch on to it. I liked both twists and didnt have a problem with either one of them. The one thing i didnt like was the last frame of the movie. I wish they wouldnt have thrown that in cuz it doesnt make sense and it kind of cheapens the movie a little. Very minor gripe overall and this is classified as a must see. Dont take my word for it though. If you look on here you can see that over 65% of people who have seen it are giving it a perfect 10!