The Prestige - Thoughts and Spoilers

Hmmmm. I admit it makes sense.

I might have to go to the movies this weekend. :smiley:

There is no copy, though. They’re both equally Angiers. Like Tesla says when Borden asks which is his hat: They all are. The two Angiers that come out of the machine are identical in all respects. They have the same memories, the same personality, the same bodies, even the same clothes. The only difference is one is standing on a balcony in front of an adoring crowd, and one is drowning in a water tank backstage.

Question- when Angiers performs the trick for the hall manager/owner, and the owner says, "It’s been a long time since I’ve seen real magic*, where did the second Angiers go? No tank, no setup, right?

Or had he already been in, and got the tank filled, and the trapdoor placed?

Sorry to bump a month-and-a-half old thread, but I just saw this movie last night and LOVED it. I love the paradox of it all…who was who and when and why, etc.

In answer to Lissla Lissar, I think Angier had already planned on how to “eliminate” the duplicate and had the trap door and tank set up below.

Here’s what I want to know: Why did Borden want to tie a more difficult knot on the girl, which led to her demise? Did he have something against Angier to begin with, was he jealous, or did he just want to increase the difficulty of the trick? That seems to be what started this deadly rivalry in the first place.

And, not having read the book, so perhaps it’s explained there, but at what point do identical twins decide to start living their lives as one, in anticipation of one day revealing their ultimate trick? Wouldn’t there be someone around who knew them when they were twins? Surely there were two separate personalities and individuals, and suddenly they decide that one will disappear off the face of the earth, and they’ll both live as “Borden” to someday pull off this trick? How do you decide who disappears and who goes on publicly living?

I mean “wow.” Just “wow.”

I try to have these types of philosophical conversations with my husband, and he just cuts me down, claiming that “it’s just a movie.”

You married the wrong guy.

:smiley: ( ducks and runs for cover )

This kind of story, be it written or cleverly transcribed into film language, is the stuff of endless interesting conversation.

Like the ones in this thread, which make me want to rent it and watch it a few more times.

I also wondered when the twins decided to start their trickery, but this part’s easy. Neither “disappeared,” both were right there all the time. Remember Borden’s assistant Fallon (I think that was the name)? That was the other twin. And neither was Borden/Fallon all the time, they switched personas often. That’s why Borden’s wife said that sometimes he loved her, and sometimes he didn’t. It’s because one of the twins did actually love her, and one didn’t. She just didn’t realize it was two different people.

Anyone know when this is coming out on DVD?

Cartooniverse, sometimes I question my decision, too. :frowning:

FlyingDragonFan, I realize that neither twin actually disappeared, I was aware that “Fallon” was the twin, but still at some point the two of them had to decide that “Borden the apprentice magician” would remain, and the “other” twin would disappear. Essentially, they traded off living as the magician-to-be. What I mean is that the other personality disappeared. All of his history, his relationships, his life, everything, basically ceased to be once the twins decided that they would share one life. When did they decide to do this, and how did they tie up any loose ends? At some point, to their friends, relatives, neighbors, government entities, etc., one of them ceased to be. It’s just all so fascinating.

Bump away… this is probably the most succesful thread I’ve ever started here! :smiley:

I would have to watch it again, since I haven’t seen the movie since opening day, but a few thoughts. Was the knot necessarily more difficult or just different? I seem to remember it was more risky. Maybe it was one of the Borden twins showing off? I’m pretty sure it wasn’t done deliberately to hurt her. Borden (both of them?) was jealous of Angier’s relationship with her, but I never got a sense that he would harm her.

Regarding when and how they began the charade, that’s a good question. It might be something that doesn’t hold up well on further thought. Maybe they were from out of country or something?

Count me as someone who thinks that fictional works like this are very thought provoking and a great topic of conversation. Sorry that you got shut down at home. At least you can have the conversations here.

Loved this movie. One the the things that the director did a good job of, I thought, was that even though it jumped around in time a lot (due to the narration), the visuals allowed us to quickly see which time period it was.

I have a pet theory that no actual sci-fi “magical duplication device” was involved, but I haven’t been able to convince my wife.

Then how do you explain the last scene of the film that shows

all of the bodies floating dead, having dropped through the traps to their drowning deaths night after night after night?

( I just can’t do it without spoilers, just in case. Sorry. )

Because it was harder. A harder knot means a harder trick, and a harder trick is a more impressive trick. The wife/assistant went along with it, too. She wanted the harder knot because she wanted to demonstrate how good an escape artist she was. Not to the audience, obviously, or even the other magicians, but mostly to herself. The over-riding theme of the entire movie is people destroying themselves through their own ego. The wife was simply the earliest casualty.

I suspect that the person of “Alfred Borden” was purely an invention of the two brothers for the stage. Essentially, both of them stopped existing, and became Borden and his assistant, Fallon, full time. They didn’t have to decide who was going to be in the public spotlight and who was going to stay behind the curtain, because they could swap out the roles regularly. This isn’t really too different from Angiers, actually. Angiers lives the role of a poor American stage magician full time, as well, and never lets on that he’s really a wealthy British lord.

As to how the twins got away with the stunt, I suspect that they didn’t have any family to speak of. Orphans, most likely, and probably with few friends, so there really isn’t anyone who knew them well enough as children to recognize them as the famous magician when they’re young men. A little forgery and/or bribery could easily produce the necessary paper trail to throw the government off the track, and Alfred Borden is born.

Only one Angiers body is ever removed from a tank and examined - the one that leads to Borden’s trial. Consider the possibility that the ones in tanks are facsimiles of one sort or another.

So how do you explain the creation of that body? And what would be the point of all those other facsimiles?

Is there any point to the movie if this is true? What is it about if not that?

I’m reviving the thread again because I just saw the movie in a dollar-house and there was a splice in a bad spot. It was when Angier (?) was doing his disappearing dove trick with the bird-saving apparatus Cutter invented. He invites the two volunteers onto the stage, they both place their hands on the cage – then the break occurred and it’s several seconds later. The theater manager is angrily breaking Angier’s contract and Cutter is saying something like, “Well, you should have seen it coming.”

Obviously something went wrong with the trick as it’s never seen again. Was it ineptitude on Angier’s part, a failure of Cutter’s apparatus, or sabotage by Borden (one of the volunteers?) or something I haven’t considered?

Oh, and Tesla’s teleporter/copier worked. Else why would there be a basement full of Angier-in-a-boxes?

Lady volunteer and Borden-as-volunteer are up on the stage, putting their hands over the cage as Angier directs them.

Angier does his countdown and meets Borden’s eyes briefly, with a dawning look of horror as he realizes something’s up, and then Borden deliberately smashes the cage in front of the entire audience–killing the bird and breaking lady volunteer’s fingers, and walking off to the sound of her screams.

End result being, of course, that nobody will book Angier or Cutter.

IIRC - the volunteers are directed to place their hands on the sides of the cage (so that between the two volunteers and Angier, all six sides of the box are covered). Borden-as-volunteer places his mangled hand on the top of the box, and that’s what makes Angiers suddenly realize that it’s Borden standing next to him, but only too late as Borden sabotages the trick…