The Prestige
The second in our magician-movie doubleheader is Christopher Nolan's The Prestige, which reunites the British director with two members of his
Batman Begins cast—Christian Bale and Michael Caine. It takes place at roughly the same time as
The Illusionist, although in different locations (London and Colorado Springs). The premise, however, is actually quite a bit different.
The Prestige is not merely setup in three-act structure but, more specifically, to follow the same three-part formula of a magic trick: the pledge, which demonstrates to the audience the ordinary nature of the trick; the turn, the part which seems like the trick, but isn't; and the prestige, the real trick, which the magician was able to produce while the audience was focused on the turn.
If you've ever figured out how a magic trick works during all the misdirection, the prestige kind of loses its pizzazz. So too does The Prestige, which is so concerned with fitting its story into the three-part magic trick formula that if you figure out the trick too soon, it undermines what is actually a pretty good story about the consequences of senseless revenge.
The Prestige gets a slight edge over The Illusionist thanks to a better cast with higher star power, a vaguely more interesting premise and a quirky little side story involving Nikola Tesla (David Bowie), Thomas Edison's main rival in the quest to harness electricity. But nothing can overcome the film's fatal flaw of focusing so hard to pull off its three-part magic trick that it forgot the most important part of all: the story.
Hopefully, Christopher Nolan can regain his footing before entering production on the highly anticipated Batman sequel, The Dark Knight.