A film that cheats the viewer - and I hated it for that

Rating: 4/10 (16 October 2016)

I'd been excited about seeing THE PRESTIGE, especially as it re-teamed two of my favourite film people from BATMAN BEGINS: the usually excellent Christopher Nolan, who delivered the excellent INSOMNIA and MEMENTO, and Christian Bale, an actor who can do no wrong in my eyes. Then what a shame it is that THE PRESTIGE turns out to be nothing more than a silly, muddled science fiction film masquerading as a serious and engaging drama.
It starts off on a strong footing, with interesting characters and situations, but quickly loses these in a stupid plot that jumps all over the place and never bothers making much sense. The biggest kick in the teeth, however, is the ending, which ties things up with two plot twists that are frankly awful. The first is a sci-fi staple – cloning. What place does it have in a supposedly realistic Victorian thriller? It just turns this film into a fantasy and loses audience interest. The second twist is the one that's apparent early on, and one of the classic 'tricks' much beloved by writers of murder mysteries and crime thrillers. It's also been done to death and was outdated about a century ago, but no, it's resurrected here and had me groaning, feeling cheated when it appeared.
THE PRESTIGE isn't a totally bad film and there are quite a few things to recommend it. It looks fantastic, and all of the electric special effects are tremendous. It also boasts a pretty good cast, with Christian Bale delivering another outlandish performance – his Cockney accent here is quite amusing – and Michael Caine presiding over things in his usual manner. Hugh Jackman I don't particularly like as an actor, and he's at best passable here; but in comparison to the hopeless Scarlett Johansson, who struggles with her British accent, he's Laurence Olivier! There are some fun minor roles for Andy Serkis and David Bowie, the latter playing the inventor Nikola Tesla and doing a good job of it. While the magic acts and tricks are engaging when they're on screen, it's just a shame that the film becomes so implausible and cops out towards the end. THE PRESTIGE contains nothing I'll want to sit through again.