The Prestige

[sickfins]

i can dig it


edit: added pic

[Pubrick]

i'm a fan.

[polkablues]

I don't get it.  Are they rival hypnotists now?  Engaged in some sort of climactic "trance-off"?

[MacGuffin]

Chalk it all up to sibling scribery
Chris and Jonah Nolan often disagree, but that in turn leads to complex, identity-probing films.
Source: Los Angeles Times



FILMMAKERS Chris and Jonah Nolan appear to be brothers in name only.

Chris has the scruffy pallor of a sleep-deprived father (the 36-year-old has three young children), while Jonah, 30, shows the robust physique of a gym rat. Chris favors suits and dress shirts, Jonah jeans and T-shirts. Chris speaks with an English accent, while Jonah's is Chicago American. Chris doesn't even use e-mail, but Jonah lives by the Internet.
 
People who meet them "think they are putting them on when they say they are brothers," says David Goyer, who wrote the story and shared screenplay credit on Chris Nolan's "Batman Begins" and wrote the story for Chris and Jonah's screenplay for the sequel, "The Dark Knight." "You don't think of brothers having totally different accents and mannerisms."

Despite all their obvious differences, though, the Nolan brothers speak with a distinct and unified screenwriting voice. Their collaborations — "Memento," "Batman Begins" and its upcoming sequel, and Friday's "The Prestige" — have accomplished what few screenwriters and directors manage: They wowed moviegoers and critics simultaneously.

"The Prestige" likely represents their greatest challenge yet. While "Memento," which Chris adapted from Jonah's short story "Memento Mori," was told in reverse chronological order, it didn't carry an exorbitant pricetag, budgeted at $5 million. "Batman Begins," on which Jonah served as a creative consultant but had no screenplay credit, cost a fortune at $150 million, but it benefited from pervasive brand-name awareness. "The Prestige," for its part, occupies Hollywood's most dangerous middle ground: It's a medium-priced (more than $40-million) adult drama based on a complicated novel unknown to most ticket buyers.

Written by English science fiction author Christopher Priest, "The Prestige" is an account of a duel between two magicians in turn-of-the-century London. Alfred Borden (played by Christian Bale) and Rupert Angier (whose first name is changed to Robert in the film and who's played by Hugh Jackman) are each obsessed with the other's tricks, especially iterations of a deception in which the rival magician appears to be transported across the stage — or even across the theater — in the blink of an eye.

The film as well as the 1996 book are anchored by the competition between the illusionists, which grows increasingly personal and cold-blooded. The book's largely diaristic narrative also strays in several directions, with elements of a ghost story and a detour into anti-spiritualism and the birth of electricity — all framed by a modern-day storytelling device. But the very literary ambitions that made "The Prestige" a memorable novel (it won the World Fantasy Award and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize) turned it into a nearly unsolvable cinematic riddle, one that would take the Nolan brothers seven years to crack.

"It's a really tough adaptation," says Chris. "It's just sprawling. It's got all this different crazy stuff in it. But you know there's a great movie in there." Adds Jonah: "It's just a grind figuring it out."

The resulting movie — like so much of the Nolans' earlier work — revolves around identity, the distinct differences of personality even within the same person. (Chris' first feature film, 1998's "Following," a movie about a mysterious voyeur made without his brother, as well as "Memento" and "Batman Begins" all dwell on various explorations of the self, the struggle between what a person assumes he is or wants to be and what he truly is destined to be.)

Those themes play a prominent role in "The Prestige," but there's not much more that can be said about the movie without giving away its plot twists. Let it be said that magic is only part of the deceit.

The movie wasn't always going to be a joint effort of the Nolan brothers. Aaron Ryder, an executive producer of "Memento," optioned Priest's book for Chris. Around the time he was directing Al Pacino in the remake of the Norwegian thriller "Insomnia," Chris tried to boil the book down.

"I spent a bunch of time trying to figure out what to do with it," Chris says. "And then it became apparent I wasn't going to have time to get on with it. So I told the story to Jonah — basically described it to him to see if it sounded interesting — and for years he wrote on it and wrote on it."

Rather than Jonah and Chris' spending all of their time sitting across a desk from each other bouncing around ideas, Jonah would retreat to write a draft by himself. Once he had enough to show his brother, he would ship it off to Chris, who would then make revisions.

"We are always talking," Jonah says. "So there's a collaboration there in terms of setting both of our minds on the task. But we write separate drafts. This has been the way that it has worked."

Key ingredient: dissent

BOTH Chris and Jonah say that their best work often grows out of their most spirited disagreements.

In the case of "The Prestige," the brothers argued over the modern-day framing device (it's out) to one character's suicide (it's in). "For the longest time, we couldn't figure out what to do with the women," Jonah says. Were they central to the story or glorified magician's assistants? They ended up favoring the former over the latter.

Nearly every line of dialogue was a battleground.

"In terms of story and script, Chris is the most rigorous taskmaster I've ever worked with," says Goyer. "It's like the way a coach would be on an athletic team, 'Give me 10 more!' And you say, 'I can't, I can't.' But you can."

"I'm almost at the point," Jonah says, "where I have a hard time thinking an idea through without hearing his opposition to it. If it's not opposed, it's not a good idea. Unless there's some friction, there is no achievement. It seems counterintuitive, but if an idea survives the combat, it's better."

Says Chris: "In all honesty, it works like this with the studio as well. When you are challenged on things, you have to really think about why they are important to you. You immediately know what it is you care about in a draft when somebody else criticizes it. It's a quite healthy process in that regard. To me, the key is to talk to somebody who has no agenda. There's no politics, no dealing with people you don't trust. And that's why I like to work with Jonah."

"It's not that I don't have an agenda," Jonah says, interrupting his older brother for once. "It's that you know what my agenda is, and most of it involves getting to the essence of the story."

As with any decision-making, though, one voice ultimately must trump the other, or else some choices would never be finalized. As with other movies, that power rests with the director, since Chris is the one who must stage the action and cut it all together.

Near the film's conclusion, for example, one of the magicians makes a lengthy speech about the state of the world; the text remains mostly unchanged from what Jonah wrote. Those words were originally spoken by Borden, but in the end Chris had Angier speak them. Says Chris: "The director is the person who has to make it work."

Being topped by his elder brother doesn't seem to bother Jonah much — "I have figured out various ways to trick him into liking my ideas," he says.

Between "Dark Knight" revisions, Jonah is working on a screenplay about the legendary 1871 Chicago fire, largely without his brother's assistance. "But I think I would probably find it impossible to write something without showing a draft at some point to Chris and figuring out what I'm blowing completely," Jonah says.

The apparent lack of competition between Jonah and Chris springs in part from their backgrounds — they never aimed for the same careers. Chris grew up wanting to be a filmmaker. Jonah dreamed of becoming a writer.

"And Chris grew up in the English school system. I grew up in the American school system," says Jonah, who attended Georgetown while his brother went to University College London; the family, including older brother Matt, moved from England to Chicago when their father's job changed. "So we were never able to compete on any of the standard markers that I think you need for a sibling rivalry. We couldn't compare our SAT scores. Chris played entirely different sports than I did. There were no points of reference, which actually was good."

Chris isn't 100% certain it will always be that way. "When my career is in the toilet," he says, "and Jonah's is doing really well — that's when there will be a sibling rivalry."

[MacGuffin]

Nolan: Prestige Was Tricky
Source: SciFi Wire

Christopher Nolan, director and co-writer of the The Prestige, told SCI FI Wire that the film was structured to match the three stages of a magic trick. "The idea was always really to address ... magic from the point of view of not trying to show magic in the film and impress people with stage magic, because that can't work on film," Nolan said in an interview. "People are aware of camera trickery and all the rest. The idea was always to create a marriage of that function according to the principles of a magic trick, or a set of magic tricks. And that involved conforming to this three-act structure."

The film, based on the book by Christopher Priest, follows the careers of two magicians, played by Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman, who become obsessed with outdoing each other. Nolan, who wrote the script along with his brother, Jonathan, said that the book's use of different points of view and fractured narrative made it particularly difficult to adapt. "It was quite challenging to find the right structure," Nolan said. "It took a lot of time. We really spent years working on the script. And it required interlocking framing devices and interlocking voice-overs, combined with the notion of structuring using the three-act structure of the trick. Yeah, it took a long time. The key being the need to express multiple points of view purposefully and clearly. It was a difficult script to write."

Although Nolan doesn't reveal how the real magic tricks in the film are done, he does let the audience in on a few secrets by the end. "The real paradox, which is the paradox of magic—but this is to me what's interesting about the subject—is that, much as the audience wants to know the secret, the secret ultimately will be disappointing," he said. "That's the nature of magic. And that's, to me, the key thing which I'm trying to do in the film." The Prestige opens Oct. 20.

[Pubrick]

some directors don't talk enuff, some talk way too much.

[last days of gerry the elephant]

I loved it. It was a little unfamiliar at first but soon after, the plot began to seem more fluent as it merges the life of the two magicians. You can tell it's a very complex concept, but well communicated through editting and pacing. **Spoilers Warning** I was not thrilled to see Nolan depend on the supernatural as the final take and I wasn't ready for that either. However, I did predict Bale's double very easily halfway through. It wasn't much of a discovery, Nolan lets you in on a few clues throughout and probably because he didn't want to disappoint anyone by making it seem as if he deliberately tricked the audience into believing a lie. I'd like to ask either brother a few questions about it, I still feel there's something more to Tesla's transport machine/trick or at least there should be, a practical method, this doubt inside of me!... or that's probably the intentional doing of Nolan...

[sickfins]

spoilers and stuff

i'll preface this by saying that i'm not one of those types that sees things coming a million miles away.  i would, however, consider myself fairly observant.

most questions i had near the end of the movie that i thought wouldn't be resolved were.  the structure of the movie is a pretty tricky one to pull off.


any scene with tesla (bowie).  i love bowie
"they're all your hat, mr. angier"
hats
opening shot: hats
"abracadabra"
"this town has electricity"
the end of the last shot/drop out of sound
the idea of a magician killing a hundred doubles of himself
little switches performed by the bordens that initially seemed unbelievable (borden getting into julia's apartment)

the flip flopping of my sentiments for the main characters was interesting.  in the end i liked neither.  maybe i liked jackman a little bit more.  but he killed all those doubles.  i don't think i'm qualified to talk much more about the movie, i really didn't pick up on everything.


borden's wife, julia was ok.
i've seen better from bale.  he was good i guess.

surprised to see thom yorke's 'analyse' as the ending credit music

[RegularKarate]

Very Disappointing... not a BAD movie, but...

SOME UNSPECIFIC SPOILERS

I hate movies that rely almost only on "twists and turns", especially ones you can see coming from fucking MILES away.  There were WAY too many clues in this movie and the plot twists were way too obvious and boring.  Two and a half hours for that?  I was REALLY hoping (as I usually do when I watch a movie as void of anything other than twists as this) that the obvious twists were just to misguide you while an actual interesting twist happened.  At least that would have been something.

It's a well made film... Bowie is very entertaining and the acting is pretty nice... there are a couple decent chuckles throughout, but it was poorly written.  It assumed the audience wasn't going to see shit coming so it got too cocky and installed so many winks and nods that it became easy to figure out.

If it would have underplayed the twists and made it more character driven or given it a better plot, it would have been a really good movie because the mood was set well.

They should have made Carter Beats the Devil into a movie.. with this and the Illusionist both being less than expected that might not ever happen.

[grand theft sparrow]

SPOILERS

I liked it.  I was able to figure out a couple of things early on but it didn't ruin the film for me.  It's a movie about magicians.  Of course there's going to be a twist. 

But there's one thing that is keeping me from enjoying this completely:

Was the other Bale a Tesla machine double or just his twin brother?  Because if they were twins, then that makes it WAY TOO convenient that he sends Hugh Jackman on a wild goose chase with the whole "Tesla is the key to my process" thing and Tesla happens to have invented a machine that does EXACTLY what Hugh Jackman needs to replicate the Transported Man trick.  I was thinking that the other Bale was a Tesla double, which would have made it a little bit easier to buy that Jackman found that machine.

But other than that, I really liked it.  It's not the masterpiece I was hoping for, and by all rights, had no real reason to expect, but it was a good time. 

[modage]

SPOILERS
I liked it.  I was able to figure out a couple of things early on but it didn't ruin the film for me.  It's a movie about magicians.  Of course there's going to be a twist. 
But other than that, I really liked it.  It's not the masterpiece I was hoping for, and by all rights, had no real reason to expect, but it was a good time. 

yep, exactly.  also: even to the point Bale was cast as Batman i still wasnt sure about him, but i love him now.  and he's great here.  i'm not sure how well this film will replay, but as a first viewing i really liked it. 

[OrHowILearnedTo]

SPOILERS AND ALL THAT JAZZ

Well it was no Memento, probably not even Batman Begins, I'd say on-par or slightly better than Insomnia. Like most of you have already said, wayyy to much is given away here. Fallen(I think that's his name) is always shot from the back and his face never shown, so it's pretty easy to figure he wasn't really who we thought he was, also the whole today you love me today you don't thing. Once you figure that the machine is a duplicator and not a transporter (cue: they're all your hats Mr. Algier) It's prety easy to know why Algier was drowning in the tub in the begining. So once i figured that out I assumed that this wasn't going to be the point of the story, but in the end it was. Nolan uses the typical unseen flashback revelation scene in the end which pissed me off because it's like "well hell we knew that already, you left us enough damn clues!", It was sort of like he was taking the audience for granted, that we couldn't figure it out ourselves. The film has the themes of obsession, and what a man has to do live a succesful life, but in the case of borden, it wasn't one man, it was two! What's the point? That's kinda cheating isn't it?

On the plus side, It looked really really good. The opening and closing shots are fantastic. Christian Bale is Awesome as always (easily one of the best actors working today) Hugh Jackman was really good as well. Scarlett Johannsen was pretty good, better than she was in the Black Dahila. David Bowie was... disguised? I couldn't even tell it was him! All the acting was good, and the movie had Ricky Jay.

I have the perfect name for Joel Siegel's review (if he feels the same i do): The Pledge is good, The Turn is great, but The Prestige doesn't live up to the other acts.

Or something along those lines...

[last days of gerry the elephant]

SPOILERS

I liked it.  I was able to figure out a couple of things early on but it didn't ruin the film for me.  It's a movie about magicians.  Of course there's going to be a twist. 

But there's one thing that is keeping me from enjoying this completely:

Was the other Bale a Tesla machine double or just his twin brother?  Because if they were twins, then that makes it WAY TOO convenient that he sends Hugh Jackman on a wild goose chase with the whole "Tesla is the key to my process" thing and Tesla happens to have invented a machine that does EXACTLY what Hugh Jackman needs to replicate the Transported Man trick.  I was thinking that the other Bale was a Tesla double, which would have made it a little bit easier to buy that Jackman found that machine.

But other than that, I really liked it.  It's not the masterpiece I was hoping for, and by all rights, had no real reason to expect, but it was a good time. 

I thought it was all of Tesla's doing...

[RegularKarate]

SPOi-Oi-Oi-Oilers

SPOILERS
But there's one thing that is keeping me from enjoying this completely:

Was the other Bale a Tesla machine double or just his twin brother?  Because if they were twins, then that makes it WAY TOO convenient that he sends Hugh Jackman on a wild goose chase with the whole "Tesla is the key to my process" thing and Tesla happens to have invented a machine that does EXACTLY what Hugh Jackman needs to replicate the Transported Man trick.  I was thinking that the other Bale was a Tesla double, which would have made it a little bit easier to buy that Jackman found that machine.

I thought it was all of Tesla's doing...

I don't think so.  He made it clear very early in his career that he had a trick that was going to blow everyone away, but he wasn't ready to do it yet.  I assume it was a twin... I think the TESLA chase WAS just convenient.

Jackman even said "you never built any machine like this before" and Bowie replied "I never said that I did"... they also didn't seem clear about what the machine was doing exactly.

BTW: Did they CG Bowie's eye?  They both moved.

[last days of gerry the elephant]

Wasn't there shots of Bale up in the mountains where Jackman was when he was visiting Tesla?
They didn't last on screen for long, but there was an implication that Bale had been there before I thought.
Tesla wouldn't have necessarily built a machine for Bale, the twin could have been a result of something that happened while he was there.
But the "convenience" of it being a lie in the first place does make sense for Bale to write in his journal mocking Jackman's trip.