The Prestige (2006)

[Dave]

Re: The Prestige (movie)

I've just seen this for the first time (on TV.) I didn't have a problem following it.

Angier *is* Lord Caldlow... there's a line he gives near the beginning of the movie about using a different name b/c he promised not to 'embarrass' his family w/ his stage pursuits.

Yes, I even clocked that part. The Tesla machine was a little far fetched, but I suspended my disbelief. What I didn't realise was this:

...why did they leave that body in the tank and then shove the tank into the store room? after it was all meant to be over, shouldn't they have taken the body out and buried it or something? would have been a disaster if someone had wandered down there and found a dead body floating in a tank looking JUSt like someone they thought had drowned that way.

Angiers said that he had had to make sacrifices himself, and he was seen to shoot one double, but it would have been far easier to drown them all. I just hadn't realised. It just seemed a bizarre but perfect way to set up Borden for Murder.

Could you really get two men so obsessed with hate for each other?

Excellent film though.

 

[Foxbat]

I'm a fan of this film.

Could you really get two men so obsessed with hate for each other?

To me, it's not so much about two men but obsession with the secrets they carry. It's just another Ahab and Moby Dick. Obsession is the key.

 

[Dave]

Reflecting on this film further, it wasn't the obsession of two men - it was at least three if you count the identical twins, (and more if you count the duplicates.)

I see that the staged murder rap was only a very clever con to obtain the secrets, with his child as a leverage; but they both made cripples of each other, not in an effort to obtain secrets, but simply out of pure revenge. It went far beyond professional rivalry.

 

[Foxbat]

It's been a while since I saw the movie or read the book but (if I recall correctly) one of them tries to back away from or end the conflict. Unfortunately, there's always some circumstance that refuels the fire.

I think this is in the book rather than the movie.

 

[J-WO]

From Michael Caine's words at the beginning all the way to the final confrontation, I see the film as an excellent metaphor about writers and writing. I don't know if Chris Priest intended that, but it's there if you look out for it.