The Prestige

david · Post by **david** » 17 Nov 2007 21:18

I just saw this movie again, and maybe its just my love of magic talking, but this movie is so great. Really, if you haven't seen it go rent it. It is by far my favorite movie. I love it. It was even better the 2nd time seeing bits of the ending reveal themselves. I know I'm not being artsy and talking about all the cinematic shit I liked, but it was just the story that really grabbed me and was so up and down. This girl I know said it was predictable, but it wasn't for me.

If you love this as much as I did feel free to comment.

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 18 Nov 2007 03:18

Can we post if we didn't love it as much as you did?

Good movie, but really predictable, to the extent that when it gets to the end, the baffling bit is if the final shot with the voice over about sacrifice and the shots of all the tanks is meant to be surprising or why they're showing it.

David Bowie is awesome in all movies.

I thought the best bit was the theme on duality and conflict within that duality. Competing and complementing pairs.

The magic was not impressive at all, but a fairly accurate depiction of how magic tricks are done. I think magic tricks are only exciting when you don't know how they're done.

david · Post by **david** » 18 Nov 2007 14:23

I didn't think it was predictable, and my dad didn't either. Guess that shows how dumb we are, but that also made the movie a whole lot better when we were surprised. Sorry there wasn't any mystery in it for you.

Muffinman · Post by **Muffinman** » 18 Nov 2007 14:28

I didn't think it was predictable. And I had to explain it to my dad in thorough detail. He's slow on movies though, maybe 'cause he prolly still thinks half in Chinese or something. I liked the movie quite a bit and want to watch it again now after your post. I never watched that other one that came out around the same time... was that any good?

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 18 Nov 2007 14:37

david wrote:I didn't think it was predictable, and my dad didn't either. Guess that shows how dumb we are, .

...well, you ARE Americans.

david · Post by **david** » 18 Nov 2007 15:01

The one that came out around the same time was the Illusionist, which I saw as well.

It was alright, not as good. The ending is like the whole story thrown together in a minute, which is cool because its like "damn" but on the other hand you sat through 1.5 hours of buildup. I don't have a concrete feeling about that movie, but I don't know if I'd recommend it. There are some cool parts though, and it is about magic as well, but its more a love story than anything.

dc

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 18 Nov 2007 15:36

Well possibly any kind of knowledge of magic tricks ruined the mystery of this movie. Tricks involving people transporting around the place almost always involve the same method used in this movie (not Tesla's machine, the other method), so as soon as you see that trick for the first time, you pretty much know exactly what's going on. Especially because there's already been so many events occurring that are completely consistent with that method. Magic tricks are almost always the easiest and most predictable explanation anyway.

HG · Post by HG » 20 Nov 2007 14:35

But did you predict the method the magician used to create a body double?

I wasn't like "Oh yeah he used a teleporter machine that creates a double also and disguised him like someone else." I may have thought it was just a body double, but i sure as hell didn't think it was a clone.

PegLegHolly · Post by **PegLegHolly** » 20 Nov 2007 14:51

Jeremy wrote:David Bowie is awesome in all movies.

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 23 Nov 2007 01:53

I thought this was an extremely cool movie. I loved the feel, the class, the story, the twists, the girl (whose name escapes me right now... what the?).

The only thing that annoyed me was how they built up that last shot when it was so, ridiculously obvious. It was obvious from the first time you saw all the hats and cats out in the forest. I've seen this a couple of times and would definately watch it again.

I don't really follow your logic on the magic, Jeremy. It's a movie, someone transporting in a movie is boring as shit. Someone cloning themselves, now that's fucken cool.

Illusionist was good too, but pretty much agree with dave. Not as cool, and more of a love story. And ed norton's powers aren't really explained or anything and that sort of bothered me. I should watch it again sometime and see if it makes more sense.

I can't stand people that don't get really obvious movies

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 23 Nov 2007 15:52

Given the seen at the start where we see all the hats, and seeing how Hugh (I forget his characters name) dies at the beginning as well, as soon as he starts talking to Tesla about his work, surely you know exactly what happens.

You already knew how Christian did his act, because there was the other guy constantly following him around, and because twins are how that trick is always done. Briefly when Tesla came up, it became conceivable that that the other Christian was a clone and not a twin, but that's pretty irrelevant to the movie either way.

Not forgetting the constant theme of sacrifice for greatness, from the moment you find out what Tesla's machine is supposed to do, you know exactly how Hugh does the trick.

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 25 Nov 2007 02:26

Um, no, most of that wasn't obvious at all. That's a big leap from a bunch of hats on the ground, to 'omg he clones himself' with no other information.

mosher · Post by **mosher** » 25 Nov 2007 10:00

james_dean wrote:Um, no, most of that wasn't obvious at all. That's a big leap from a bunch of hats on the ground, to 'omg he clones himself' with no other information.

I don't know man.

The hats was when I formed my hypothesis that proved to be right.

I didn't think it was that big a leap, a machine does some function to a hat, fine, do it to a person.

Though I did think their killing and storing method was sorta retarded. Why were they keeping all the evidence?

It was a really elaborate process to go through just to do one magic trick. And like.. they were gonna run out of room fast!

Kinda silly in that respect. But maybe that's the logic in me talking.

If they really wanted to be efficient they should have him replicate into a furnace. Where is the barf emoticon?

Thooouuugh, I did like the movie! I enjoyed the twists and cool pseudoscience talk.

I wonder what watching it again would be like once you know where it's all headed.

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 25 Nov 2007 14:08

james_dean wrote:Um, no, most of that wasn't obvious at all. That's a big leap from a bunch of hats on the ground, to 'omg he clones himself' with no other information.

You had so much information other than the hats. If you read my post, I clearly said that it's as soon as Tesla begins talking about his work, and you find out he's trying to clone things, that you realise exactly how Hugh does the trick and how he "died" and you already know how Christian does it.

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 26 Nov 2007 00:57

My bad, I misunderstood what you meant.

calemccoy · Post by **calemccoy** » 06 Dec 2007 13:26

I LOVED this movie. i think you guys might have mised some aspects of it. there is MASSIVE symbolism throughout.

-the two yellow birds, how one dies and the other lives,
-the kid even says "where's his brother?"

and a bunch of other things ill leave for you to find out be rewatching it. i saw it 3 times in theatres, becasue i love dit so much. i used to be really into magic too, so it would be the equivalent of excitement to me now if a footbag movie came out. but yeah, it rules. and the illusionist wasnt as good.

CautionFragile · Post by **CautionFragile** » 06 Dec 2007 13:51

This movie was on last night, and I watched, and I sure did dig it up styles wicked wilde.

I think you guys are over analyzing things. It's a movie based on storyline AND character development, not just, "check out the best magic tricks ever done, with a twist". I mean, this wasn't an M. Knight Schmamamamlllan movie after all. Also, it's set in the days of olde, where the knowledge of how this trick is done wasn't as common as it may be today.

I can think of tons of movies that I've seen that were completely predictable that I thouroughly enjoyed, because I understood that I was watching a movie for entertainment purposes.

Oh yeah, and I'm totally in love with Scarlett Johansson, and will marry her someday, just you wait and see.