Review 143: The Prestige
Based on the novel The Prestige by Christopher Priest, Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) are rival stage magicians in London at the end of the 19th century. Obsessed with creating the best stage illusion, they engage in competitive one-upmanship with tragic results.
The plot is a genius work of art. Nolan structures the film as though it were the three acts of how a magician performs a trick in the same way as though a film is a three act play. It includes the three steps: the Pledge (the magician shows you something ordinary), the Turn (the magician takes the ordinary something and turns it into something extraordinary) and the Prestige (you bring that something back).
He show us elements in pllain sight Nolan trusts us as an audience to not pay attention to that. He understands that we're not looking for the secret, we want to be fooled.
Obsession, secrecy and sacrifice fuel their battle as both of them contribute their fair share to the deadly duel of one-upmanship with disastrous consequences. Angier's obsession with beating Borden costs him Cutter's friendship whilst also providing him with a collection of dead bodies; Borden's obsession with maintaining the secrecy of his trick leads to his wife Sarah (Rebecca Hall) to question their relationship which eventually leads to her demise. Angier ultimately looses Olivia because of him and his "tricks" inhumanity.
how it can destroy us and as our characters go on this journey and get more ambitious their obsession grows and their allies are turned against them.
Manipulation: Throughout the film the characters lie to one another, steal each others ideas and trick one another.
Obsession: The rivalry between Angier and Borden dominates the film. They're these two people who each have something the other doesn't and who can't live without each other because they're so obsessed with each other. It gets to the point where this obsession consumes their lives and creates a shrowd of darkness around themselves and their loved ones.
Their conflict is also expressed through class warfare: Borden as The Professor, a working-class magician who prefers to get his hands dirty, versus Angier as The Great Danton, a classy, elitist showman whose accent makes him appear American.
Film critic Matt Brunson claims that the complex theme of duality is best exemplified by Angier and Boden - the film never choose to depict either magician as good or evil adding a hint of moral ambiguity to the piece.
Angier's theft of one of Borden's certain illusions in the film echoes many real-world examples of stolen tricks among magicians. Outside the film, similar rivalries include magicians John Nevil Maskelyne and Harry Kellar's dispute over a levitation illusion.
The Prestige can also be seen as an allegory for filmmaking as a whole: In the ways he crafts this film, Nolan shows us as an audience that the best magicians working today are the best filmmakers and they are the ones who can do real magic. They create stories (and occasionally twists) out of thin air and transport us into a brand new world. Just as Nolan does here.
Christopher Nolan's direction is stylish, the score by David Julyan is creepy and gets the films tone right, the cinematography is gorgeous and captures the beauty and majesticity of 1890s London, the production design (recreating 1890s London) is breathtaking, the costumes are fabulous, the make-up is top notch, the sound effects are great, the sound mixing is superb, the suspense is killing, the tension is constant and the ending was excellent.
The acting is wonderful, Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman are at the top of their game here.
Michael Caine is terrific as the stage engineer (ingenieur) who works with Angier and Borden,
Scarlett Johansson is bold as Olivia Wenscombe, Angier's assistant and lover. She is the easiest form of misdirection.
Rebecca Hall is lovely as Sarah, Borden's wife. She's someone who has a lot of emotional bagage thrust upon her. She ends up feeling so broken and disturbed by her husbands behaviour.
David Bowie is extraordinarily charismatic playing Nikola Tesla.
Now you're looking for the secret. But you won't find it because, of course, you're not really looking. You don't really want to work it out. You want to be fooled, 5/5.
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