The Prestige

This movie was (also) brought to my attention by a 'reel' on Instagram---it is true, I have come to spend more time on Instagram than I used to do in the past. What can you say? It has come fruitful! I guess one can think of it as seeing a trailer. This movie originally came out in 2006 and I had not been informed of its existence until recently. 

The short scene I saw involved an inmate in jail who was being treated harshly and the inmate ended up fooling a guard for which all the other inmates started cheering. I liked this. Sort of a small rebellion. Some jerk being humiliated in front of everyone---a small payment for his bad behaviour. So the movie interested me and I searched for the name of the movie again---you know the deal. 

If you look up this movie and see the director's name and the actor list, you do not need any further convincing to decide to watch the movie. The inmate I mentioned above is played by Christian Bale. Interestingly enough, I have not yet reviewed a movie on this blog starring him yet. It is interesting because I like the actor. Well, I didn't like him as much until 2022, so maybe it's normal.

I did not know that this was a Christopher Nolan movie until the very end of the movie when his name appeared on the screen. This is odd since I had looked up the list of all C. Nolan movies recently and I don't remember seeing this on the list. I guess it happens---I can't remember every single word I read. I must admit, though, when I saw his name on the screen, it all made sense because it was a really good movie. If you think over it a few seconds more you can actually recognize the Nolan style in the movie, although I hadn't noticed it during the movie. Well, now you know it's a Nolan movie, so you might have a different experience with the movie than I did. Or, maybe you have seen the movie and still didn't know the director! Then, maybe you'll share the same thought processes with me. In any case, gentle reader, I hope you are a person who likes Nolan movies.

What did I mean when I said "the Nolan style"? I won't coin this phrase but it's something I just made up. What I try to say with it is the mind-bending aspect of his movies. Nolan is also a director who likes to work with some of the people he already worked with before again---this is another part of his style. Maybe you can guess who I mean here: Christian Bale and Michael Caine. He really keeps casting them! It's as if I am complaining but I really can't because I also like these men. After Nolan worked with M. Caine in Batman Begins, he re-hired Caine in The Prestige, and The Dark Knight (okay, this was the same character), and then Inception, then The Dark Knight Rises, then Interstellar, Dunkirk and Tenet! Here you go, count these and then if you ever go to a trivia night where the question is "How many Christopher Nolan movies did Michael Caine appeared in?", you know the answer! You know, one side of me wants to say, are you just casting your friends? But that's obviously not true, and I highly enjoy Caine's performances in Nolan movies. Similar things happened with Bale but I won't go into much detail here. Maybe another good trivia question would be "how many movies featured both Christian Bale and Michael Caine?". That's a good question. Before I go back to our movie, I'll just mention here Nolan's upcoming movie Oppenheimer. If you check its cast, you can see that it's really promising to be an incredible movie---we'll just have to wait a few more months until it comes out, though.

Back to our movie. If you like psychological thrillers and/or mind-bending movies, you'll like this movie. I should definitely let you know that this movie is not one of those "sit back and relax" movies, it's more like a "sit back and pay attention" movie. You should pay attention to the movie while watching, if you really want to enjoy it. Here's my experience with the movie in terms of the timeline: First half an hour, I found the movie to be boring. Don't stop reading yet though. The next 45 minutes, I started thinking "hmm, maybe this movie is interesting". Then it was really interesting (and I thought "hmm this is a good movie") for the rest until the very end. At the very end, my opinion changed. My verdict was that it was a really good movie. So my advice is that if you watch this movie, don't give up in the first 30 minutes. 

Why was I bored in the first 30 minutes? There might be many factors which determined my mood at that time. However, I think it might be because I didn't find the rivalry of two magicians interesting. This is really about one's own likes. Maybe you do like magicians and maybe you won't find any minute of the movie boring. I think that this movie is one of the examples where the synopsis is very misleading. If you read it, it would say "oh there are two stage magicians and they are in rivalry" which is true in terms of the story. However, there are really a lot more interesting things happening...although I won't give you spoilers. These interesting/weird things don't start right at the beginning, hence my boredom at the beginning.

When you see "psychological thriller" and "mind-bending" in the description of a movie, maybe you already know to expect a plot twist. If you like movies with plot twists, I strongly believe that you will like this movie. Was this a spoiler? I don't think so. You'll see what I mean when you watch the movie. I do enjoy successful plot twists. 

Speaking of a plot twist, I want to talk about Christian Bale's performance/character in this movie. I don't know if you've seen him in American Psycho but I think his character in this movie might have been even more psycho than his character in the movie American Psycho. After the movie ends, you kind of think back and realize some things which are things that left me speechless. I recently saw a part of one of Christian Bale's interviews. He is being asked "how long do the characters stay in your head?" and he answers "Do they ever leave?". I must say, this is really concerning to me after seeing American Psycho. Also, The Prestige even if somehow you don't count American Psycho. So, now, after seeing this interview bit, I think I like Christian Bale a bit less but it is a crystal-clear fact that he is a talented and successful actor.

The movie also features Nikola Tesla which is one of the interesting aspects of the movie. You may wonder: how did Tesla come into this story/movie? Well, I guess you'll have to watch the movie for this or read the plot online (which I don't recommend because it would ruin the movie) but I can tell you this much: in the "olden" times, science was also magic. So here is your connection to Tesla.

Lastly (about actors), and briefly, I will mention Hugh Jackman. If you have been reading my posts, there is a good chance that you already know I like to see Hugh Jackman in movies. It was nice to see him in this movie too. His character was nice and his performance was good (although maybe not spectacular, but that's okay). 

Perhaps it is apt to finish this post by explaining the name of the movie. The association I'd make with the word prestige is definitely not the one the movie meant. Apparently, a magic act has three parts: the pledge, the turn and the prestige---they give this information in the movie, I had no idea before. It says that this last part is crucial to a magic act (or illusion/performance) and without it there is no point of the magic act. In a sense, if this whole movie were an illusion (and it technically is), the last part (or the end of the movie) is The Prestige part and it all makes sense because that's when the audience claps. In fact, I am not making this up, the film makers really tried to structure the screenplay according to this and knowing this actually explains my perception of the movie in three parts as mentioned above. By the way, this movie is actually based on a book, so we shouldn't pass without giving the credit. It is true that the film makers did an excellent job but the story was pretty good to begin with.

If you haven't seen this movie yet, I strongly suggest you see it at your earliest convenience (given that you satisfy at least one of the conditions mentioned above about liking the movie, e.g. if you like Nolan movies).

I give 8/10.