Not being into comic books, fantasy, sci fi, or other stories requiring special effects to tell, summer is pretty much a dead loss for me as a movie-going season.
Just got home from the first movie of “my” movie season, fall: The Illusionist, with Edward Norton, who’s good, as always – and Jessica Biel, whose previous work I’m unfamiliar with, but who’s good in this. Plus the always-reliable Paul Giamatti.
Grown up characters – grown up situations – a plot whose every twist and turn was not predictable from a million miles away and that required that the viewer pay attention connect their own damn dots.
I liked it very much, and definitely recommend it if there are any other adults out there who like to see a movie from time to time. (It’s not necessary to see it on the big screen, BTW, for the theater-eschewers out there; but keep it in mind for your Netlix queue when the time comes.)
I liked it as well, though I didn’t think it was that opaque. It was pretty obvious that they weren’t going to really kill the heroine, for example. But I did like the surprise of the gemstones coming from the prince’s sword. I didn’t see that one coming.
What I liked was at the very end when the Paul Giamatti character was at the train station, how they showed him figuring out how everything had happened – but in a very fast (less than a minute?) montage, instead of some long exposition. It was more like they gave you enough clues for you to figure it out yourself, instead of spoonfeeding it to you.
And I agree, I wasn’t entirely convinced by the way they set up the last section … but it was still very fun to watch.
Just came back from it. I love mysteries and stories about magic and magicians, and that’s one of my favorite eras for film settings. It looked beautiful, and told a nice story that felt almost like a fairy tale. Even Philip Glass’ score contributed to the tone of ethereal fantasy. I was very much reminded of The Princess Bride during the flashback to their youthful love. Edward Norton is my second-favorite actor (after Johnny Depp), and Paul Giamatti is getting better with everything I see him in – the performances were top-notch. The “evil” Duke was played by Rufus Sewell, who was also great as the lead in one of my favorite movies ever, Dark City. Anyway, it was a very good movie, although I’m more excited about this fall’s other big period piece about magicians, The Prestige, with Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman. I read the novel it was based on, and I suspect the movie will be even better than The Illusionist, and much darker!
Oh, I meant to say that the reveal at the end – the quick montage of Giamatti’s character putting everything together in his mind – reminded me strongly of a similar sequence from the end of The Usual Suspects. I’m not saying it was a ripoff, but Burger, the director of The Illusionist, had to have seen the earlier film and noted the effective technique for solving the mystery without boring the audience with a lengthy after-the-fact exposition.
I have to announce that I have a renewed mad crush on Edward Norton–even with that Godawful beard. I hate that Rufus Sewell seems to get stuck in these evil villain roles more and more frequently now, though.
And Paul Giamatti is vastly underappreciated. He’s fantastic.
It was a solid film–not really remarkable or astounding, but enjoyable, with some great moments of humour. The actors really sold their scenes and some of the magic tricks–even if you could figure out how they were done–were breathtaking.
Hate to ask this, but is Norton’s vice still that bit nasal? I’ve seen some movies with him and while I agree that he’s a great actor, his voice becomes a bit grating to me.
It was a fun movie and I enjoyed it, but I think the director failed in what he was trying to do. I’m usually pretty bad guessing the end of movies, but I and everyone I saw it with basically predicted the rest of the movie from the halfway point.
Even though it didn’t work out, I especially liked the idea of
keeping whether the magician’s magic is real or fake ambigious to the end. As I said, I think that most of the audience had pretty much come to the correct conclusion by the time of Sophie’s death, but it was a good idea anyways
In anycase, the acting and characters were good enough to make it fun despite a failed plot device. The look on the Inspectors face at the end when he see’s the conclusion of “the trick” is probably the best part of any movie I saw this summer.
Mrs. R and I just saw The Illusionist this weekend, and we were pretty impressed. The acting was first-rate, the setting unusual and completely appropriate. It kept us engrossed.
However, later that night, we
wondered how a funeral was conducted without the Duchess’ body .
If there was no funeral, then how did the audience for the second set of performances (the ghost-materializing ones) know that the duchess was dead?
And, for that matter, why do the second set of performances at all?
They weren’t to drive the prince mad with guilt; he knew he hadn’t killed the Duchess. They weren’t for the benefit of the hoi polloi; what they thought mattered not at all; they had no power. They weren’t to convince Inspector Uhl that the prince was guilty; he already “knew” that the prince had killed the Duchess.
But the prince didn’t necessarily know he hadn’t killed the duchess; remember, they put the stuff in his brandy (or whatever it was) and he passed out – he didn’t think he did, but he didn’t know he didn’t, since he could have done it in a blackout.
and re: the funeralThey’d get an accomplice undertaker in. There had to be a funeral, since the duchess had parents, etc., who wouldn’t just accept her disappearance at face value.
But near the end, the prince points out to Uhl that the Illusionist could have framed him; can we take this to mean that he knew he wasn’t responsible?
I don’t think he was entirely sure one way or the other, although I don’t think, given his personality, he would have fully accepted his guilt even if he thought he had. (“The bitch made me do it!”)
Maybe it was just because I was really tired yesterday when I went to see this movie, but I found it rather boring.
All of the magic that he was doing in the beginning of the movie could have been done without the CGI that was so obviously used. I love magic shows and the main reason is because you are constantly amazed at what the performer can do. It’s not nearly as impressive when you see a CGI playing card floating in the air.
Other than that, I found it rather predictable. It was really hard to keep my intrest up when I knew
that the dutchess was quite alive and well. And that the Illusionist was ruining the prince’s life more out of spite than anything else.
I found Norton’s character difficult to sympathize with thus making it difficult to cheer for him as the foil to Sewell’s overhanded villany.
I found Giamatti’s character the most likable, but you have to wonder how a person could become a police inspector and not figure out over the course of a few days what I figured out in an hour.
