Only time will
tell if this film will remain corporeal or disappear like
a summoned spirit. Due to its suspicious release at almost
the exact same time as the extremely similar The Prestige,
the two films will undoubtedly be compared to one another,
leaving one the classic, and the other the also-ran. And
while I am more a fan of The Prestige, there
are several elements of
The Illusionist which I did find superior.
This film was
much more magical than its counterpart. Of course both are
about illusionists/magicians, but the technical explanations
behind the acts were revealed in The Prestige whereas
The Illusionist has a more mysterious aura about
it. Watching a movie about magicians and getting the same
same sense of awe and wonder one experiences at a live show
is a very rewarding feeling. The trade-off is that the story
itself is less compelling. Through the film, we follow entertainer
The Great Eisenheim (Edward Norton) as he uses his magical
act to bring him closer to the woman he loves in turn-of-the
century Austria-Hungary. As a child he, the son of a cabinet-maker,
fell in love with a noble's daughter Sophie (Jessica Biel)
but they were kept apart due to class differences. Now she
is the bride-to-be of the corrupt Crown Prince Leopold (Rufus
Sewell.) As he rekindles his romance with Sophie, the prince
dispatches Inspector Uhl (Paul Giamatti) to find a way to
stop him and his magic show. Though this may seem a complex
plot, it is delivered in a fairly straightforward manner.
There's nothing inherently wrong with this approach, but compared
to the complicated narrative of The Prestige, it
seems lacking.
A notable success
of this film is its ability to recreate the feel of late Nineteenth
Century mysticism, and early motion pictures. The aesthetics
of the flickering film, sepia tones, and vignetting around
the corners of the frame place the audience in an era in which
the fascination with the so-called ether, and the spirits
that dwelt there was alive and very much in the public's mind.
This further heightens the sense of mystery already present
in the film.
I was quite surprised
with the performances in the film, even though I had doubts
going in. I have never had high expectations from Jessica
Biel, but she wasn't half bad. (She wasn't half-good, for
that matter, but at least she didn't weigh the film down.)
The standout performance was that of Rufus Sewell, who impressed
me even more than Giamatti and Norton, both of whom I admire
greatly. His plotting Leopold drove the film forward, while
the rest of the cast seemed to delay in their movement and
hesitate in their motivation.
The primary detractor
from the film is that it relies on the clichéd last-minute
revelation by a character to explain the plot to the audience.
I won't go so far as to tell you the twist, but know that
it's there, and you won't really understand it until they
show you, in a detailed montage of previously unseen events,
what really happened. While this technique seems a cheap way
out to me, and should leave no questions remaining, I am always
left wondering how the character came to their realizations
so conveniently and suddenly.
The Illusionist
is a well-constructed film, which might even be too well-put-together
for its own good. It's not breaking any traditions or boundaries
and thus might be slightly predictable. I fear that, in the
quest for posterity, it may not fare as well as The Prestige,
but then again, it may be the final payoff of this great illusion
to have more up its sleeve long term than I can tell now.
