The audience likes to be fooled

Rating: 8/10 (24 November 2006)

As sportsmen say, reaching the top is not the toughest part, but maintaining oneself there. Each new prestigious movie director can say so, and Christopher Nolan is no different. After Memento's clamorous success, in 2000, he's achieved great prestige among filmmakers and the audience. Nonetheless, some disappointing pictures, such as Insomnia and Batman Forever, made his prestige to be questioned. Recovering credibility is a demanding job, and Nolan's The Prestige managed to bedazzle the audience again. As Truffaut once said, cinema is the art of deceiving. Nothing is real, as well as in magic, when the audience is intensely pleased to be fooled. Knowing that, Nolan used magic as the main ingredient of his tasty recipe. And the utterly irresistible result is completed with a mix of great actors (Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman as protagonists, plus the terrific supporting roles performed by Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson and David Bowie), realistic costumes, gloomy photography and a powerful direction. Not even the presence of the element "Deus ex ma china", a Latin phrase used to describe an unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot, has managed to spoil The Prestige's magic. If you want to be thrilled by the duel of two men willing to prove who were the best of their professions at that time, this is your call. And don't worry, it's okay to be fooled.