With three of my favourite actors (Morgan Freeman, Mark Ruffalo and Woody Harrelson), and Jesse Eisenberg as well (so good in 'The Social Network’), I expected good things from this movie.
There is a plot line all about magicians and magic, and a lot of very well executed surface. The big set piece magic tricks are compelling viewing. There is a delight to incrementally understanding the consequences of the elements of each trick. You want to know what is going to happen next. The viewer is constantly pondering whether ‘what they see, is what they get’. And, the structure of the movie ensures that for good measure, so that we can savour and wonder at it again, each trick is analysed after its event.
We are repeatedly reminded by the characters that all good tricks are accomplished by the art of distraction, and I was aware that my attention was being directed towards one place in the story whilst something was furtively happening elsewhere. I was therefore kicking myself at the end of the film when the big reveal was made; I really should have seen it coming.
There is a nice repartee established between the four magicians who are thrown together as the central act of the film. Harrelson contributes a well-trodden turn now that he has his wisecracks down pat. However, especially with Eisenberg unfortunately repeating his Mark Zuckerberg schtick, it did still seem a little conventional - I have seen a lot of stories containing a group of unhappy bed fellows humorously taking pot shots at each other in an effort to get along.
With only a passing reference to it midway through the detail of a complicated storyline, the final resolution for the band of four magicians seemed an underwhelming rather than climactic ending. It appeared almost unannounced out of left field; why would they aspire to the future they chose?
I again enjoyed a solid, reliable Morgan Freeman performance, especially when he put in a couple of rounds against Michael Caine.
I did not, however, ever really buy into Mark Ruffalo’s turn as a FBI agent. I couldn’t see any trace of the competence that his bosses believed him to have to put him onto the case in the first place. Having hinted at an historical motivation driving his partner, the movie never developed this concept further. Questions about her role were raised but then simply ignored with no answers offered - perhaps another deliberate distraction, but a very unsatisfying one nonetheless.
At times, because of all these points, the film had a rather disjointed quality. I wonder if more scenes were shot in which some of these themes were explored more thoroughly, but discarded during the editing decision-making to keep the running time below an acceptable two hours.
This is an interesting, pop-corn movie (engaging during consumption, but ultimately a fast-food pleasure rather than a lavish gourmet meal). Plenty of flashy surface, but not full of the intellectual depth it would have you believe it possesses. A good, end-of-week viewing pleasure if you just want to be entertained and not taxed with a meaningful narrative.