The Illusionist (1 Viewer)

[Chris Atkins]

The lack of explanation for or believability of the illusions is not a knock against the film, in my opinion. As I expressed above, the film is really about romance, not magic, so that cinematic sleight of hand can be forgiven.

 

[Qui-Gon John]

I just think the whole premise would have been much more believable and interesting if he were supposed to be an illusionist/magician but in fact had some supernatural powers which enabled him to perform these feats.

 

[Tim Glover]

Well said Chris. I agree.

 

[Kirk Tsai]

If the movie were about romance, then the Norton tricks distract from the theme of the movie. As they are now, I think they set up audience expectations, and then fail to meet them.

I thought the movie was not strong in the romance department. To me, it was Giamatti's position, as the right hand man to power and bureacrat, as an admirer and persecutor of Norton, that was really driving the picture. The romance plot was perfunctory.

 

[Chris Atkins]

Kirk:

Giamatti was certainly a strong character, but he was an antagonist to the romance. The entire deception of the latter half of the film--indeed, the entire new act that he created with the help of the Chinese stage hands--was all designed to secure a new life between the illusionist and his lady. Contrast that to the prestige, where the characters are driven by the desire to be the best magician.

 

[Joe D]

The fact that some of the magic tricks could not be real didn't really bother me.

I just think it is cool that we got two good movies about magicians in one year, and they are totally different from each other.

 

[Joe D]

The Black Dahlia is also nominated for Cinematography, and that film was horrible (great cinematography though).

 

[Kirk Tsai]

Chris, I don't disagree with your plot description, but the romance at to me was not a well developed theme or relationship. The two, plot and theme, are not the same thing. A lot of movies can have a "love conquers all" type of message at the end of the movie, but that doesn't make the ride about the love.

In The Prestige, I too agree that romance is not the focus of the movie, but the Rebecca Hall character had a stronger, real presence in the movie. I felt the Biel character is drawn to be a standard lost love, without any distinguishing personal, memorable strokes. That's probably a large reason why I don't view the romance angle very moving or interesting in The Illusionist. Of course, some have praised Biel in the role (my view: adequate and unmemorable), so opinions obviosly vary.

 

[Andres Munoz]

Great film. I can't believe it is getting nickpicked to death here because of the films "illusions".

BTW, this might sound totally off-topic but I just have to say that Jessica Biel has such a nice ass! You could really tell at the end when she was wearing those tight pants and her back is to the screen. She was brushing the horse. I know, I'm a perv, lol.

 

[Jason Seaver]

Well, a big chunk of the film is a mystery predicated on the Edward Norton character's ability as an illusionist. If someone watching the movie can't believe in that, then the mystery isn't effective. And some people (myself included) really hate mysteries that cheat.

And, it's not just that. The writing is pretty poor, and Edward Norton is not doing his best work at all. He's an often-great actor, but give him an accent and he almost always winds up looking awful.

 

[Josh.C]

I think that many of us could believe in the mystery Jason, which is why the film worked for me (and many others on this forum). The fact that we don't exactly know how some of the illusions were created just adds to the mystery. I don't think everything has to be explained in a movie, otherwise we lose one of our greatest movie watching assets..... Imagination.

Also, I had no problems with Norton's accent, and strongly disagree that it makes him look "awful".

Norton is brilliant in just about every role he plays imo, and this one was no different.

JC

 

[Seth Paxton]

I don't think that was the intention Kirk, but I can see a point that how it was scripted makes it come off like this. The admiration/antognist plotline brought Paul's character more to the front than the romance plot. I took this to be because the "surprise" agenda (not that surprising which is my knock on the film) is supposed to be kept low key and they tried to distract you away from it with Paul (ironic for a plot about a magician ).

 

[Jason Seaver]

To each his own, but I do tend to think that a mystery story really has to be tight, and attention must be paid to details. Not every movie has to explain everything, but one so concerned with illusions, mechanisms, and sleight-of-hand really should - if you're going to invite the audience to engage that part of the brain, you really should play fair.

 

[Will_B]

Indeed! NSFW (celebrity gossip site, not that bad):
http://tinyurl.com/35xqom

 

[Andres Munoz]

Will, what are you doing to me??

 

[DeeF]

I finally watched this movie (in High-Def, from cable).

It was compelling enough, and I enjoyed its "look," the yellow-light of the 19th century.

But by the end, I realized, it's pretty much a mess. Not so much incoherent, but weightless -- the characters have no yearnings. Even the sex scene wasn't sexy enough. The romance isn't romantic, and isn't believable, since Duchesses didn't consort with poor Jewish boys, particularly as children.

The end of the movie was predicted long in advance, which is never good (I also didn't enjoy The Usual Suspects for the same reason).

And ultimately, a movie which is about tricks tries and fails to show how the tricks work, because they're all done with CGI. The tricks would have been impossible, so the movie breaks its own rules.

Thumbs down.

 

[Henry Gale]

 

[Jeff_Krueger]

At first I also felt a little disappointed with the movie because of the Illusions not being possible as shown, but then this resolved itself when I looked closer at the narrative perspective. When you consider that all of the scenes in which illusions are performed it is all from the perspective of the inspector, he is recounting it all from how he remembered the tricks. Things often become somewhat more grand or slightly distorted in memory, once you consider this you realize that the film doesn't cheat at all.

 

[Andres Munoz]

I think he did. (j/k)

 

[Les Samuel]

Simply put, it was a very good movie...