Best of the year so far

Rating: 8/10 (3 August 2013)

I was intrigued by this film from watching the trailers. Loving magic, I decided that it would be worth seeing - and it was worth every penny for the ticket.
Apart from the stunning magic and special effects, the most unusual part of this film is that there is no real lead character: most of the characters seem to take up roughly equal time on the screen, so no particular star seems to be carrying the story.
That said, Morgan Freeman's role was very much an enlarged cameo performance, which he played magnificently. But then it's always a pleasure watching Morgan Freeman.
The only thing that riled me was that, despite all the wonderful things in it, the story just didn't hang together: it simply didn't make sense, especially the ending. Normally this would drive me mad, but the film as a whole was so mesmerising, that I actually didn't realise that there were a million gaps and logical failures until I got home.
I'm giving the film a solid 8/10, which would have been higher if just a little more time had been spent on working the plot through.
All in all, it's the best film I've seen so far this year and, judging from the upcoming offerings, it's likely to remain that way until the 2014 releases his the big screen. So allow credulity to take a back seat and go to the cinema to enjoy probably the wildest ride available.