A mysterious story of two magicians whose intense rivalry leads them on a life-long battle for supremacy — full of obsession, deceit and jealousy with dangerous and deadly consequences. From the time that they first met as young magicians on the rise, Robert Angier and Alfred Borden were competitors. However, their friendly competition evolves into a bitter rivalry making them fierce enemies-for-life and consequently jeopardizing the lives of everyone around them. Set against the backdrop of turn-of-the-century London.
I’ll say straight up this is probably the best movie of the year so far without much competition, it’s been a pretty bad year for movies all in all after 2005 which has a clean sweep of great movies, 2006 performed pretty badly, a good sign before watching this movie was the extremely strong 8.2 at IMDB.
It lived up to expectations! KY even joined us to watch it for the second time.
This is a truly allstar cast mixing new talent with old, pitting Hugh Jackman (Robert Angier) and Christian Bale (Alfred Borden) against each other is a work of genius, both have already proved themselves with movies such as X-men and Batman Begins and even more so for Bale with the haunting The Machinist.
The sparks really fly between them, imagine turn of the century magicians fighting for audiences and fame, Bale (Borden) is the technical expert, the magical genius, but his showmanship lacks the pull to bring audiences..Where as Jackman (Angier) is the opposite, suave, charming and the superior showman, but his tricks are lacking, his technical knowledge and innovation aren’t matching Bale.
Michael Caine of course puts in a stirling performance with his strong screen prescence, a lesser actor would have paled in this supporting role.
David Bowie pops up too, did you spot him?
I can’t really talk about the story without ruining it, just watch out for the the pledge, the turn and finally the prestige. You do have to suspend belief a bit though, it’s not a real story, it has elements of fantasy or sci-fi and stars some great scientists from the same period.
The cinematography, set design, production and direction are top notch, the pacing of the movie is excellent and has multiple narrators, so you see the same things from various views. It’s a dark brooding movie showing the nasty side of human nature.
Christopher Nolan is really showing us what he’s capable of with Memento, Batman Begins, Insomnia and now this!
Just go and watch this movie now.
I give it a film of the year 9/10.
Agree. My favourite movie of the year as well.
BEST MOVIE! YEAY! I LOVE HUGH JACKMAN!
christian bale reminded me of tom cruise throughout the movie… spoiled it a bit for me :X
excellent movie… indeed best this year so far. some minor gripes though. but can’t discuss that here for fear of spoiling the movie
It was a great flick but definitely NOT the movie of the year. That main trick was far-fetched and it spoilt the realness of the show. Still, it was very enjoyable!
and how the heck “The Departed” got 8.3 rating?
oi, wtf.. call me also la
Another movie to put on my “to watch list”.
Over here in the UK, the stupid but brilliant movie “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan” is on top.
I didn’t think much of the film when i first saw it – mostly becaused I figured out the whole mystery pretty early in the movie.
But strangely, i couldn’t stop thinking of it for the whole next week.
Almost every idle moment i had, i was thinking about the film’s various plot twists and remembering all the little signs that pointed towards the revelation at the end. And then, I started to think about how bloody brilliant the acting was.
So yes, it’s probably one of the films of the year – next to Silk, of course 🙂
nyg: Aye well there’s 2 months left for it to be beaten heh.
suanie: Hahahahaha well yeah that’s very much a bad thing.
Kelvin: Yah some minor things, but nothing enough to spoil the movie.
Gallivanter: I have to completely disagree with you, the whole point we go to movies is to enjoy a story, some fantasy, something far-fetched. If every movie was completely realistic they would be boring.
spiller: None of them has seen real Infernal Affairs? Haha.
v0ices: I did ask if they’d called you, KY said you were driving or something.
It was extremely last minute (Show started 11.20pm, I left home 11:05pm).
Adam: I’m really gonna enjoy that, I love the Borat character, I’ve got all the Ali-G DVD’s, Sacha is a genius!
Chris: Yah it works on you like that haha, haven’t seen Silk, with have to look it up.
huh.. driving? You meant racing.
But it was not til night! it was only in the evening.
Oh well, will just catch it with my colleagues
What I can’t really understand though is why *highlight for spoilers*: Bale twin 1 or twin 2 killed Jackman’s wife. They never really got round to explaining that bit did they?
I think Borat should be best movie of the year.
One of the best flick of the year because it portrayed the darkest traits of the human mind – greed, deceit, desperation and ruthlessness.
Acting was superb as usual. But it was how they managed to keep me in suspense with all the twists n turns that earns my respect.
AND Hugh Jackman always score points with me ;p
nyg, got explanation what
v0ices: Haha no idea man, I didn’t make the call, do catch the movie though, not to be missed..
nyg: That wasn’t really a mystery, it was an accident..it was explained pretty well in the first parts all about the knots etc.
Liew: I’m hoping so too, I guess it’ll be cut to shreds here tho?
Bluryee: Indeed both the lads seem to get good responses from the ladies 🙂 Acting was superb!
yea, it’s definately one good movie. alot of curvy turns. my favourite movie for this year.
Reminds me of a novel about two rival magicians, also set in London I think. REAL magicians, sorcery and all. I think it’s called something Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell something something.
genedavinci: Yah excellent suspense and acting to keep the pace up.
lionel: Sounds familiar…this was based on a Novel too, but the same title “The Prestige”