The Prestige

This is a tremendous movie that is meticulously crafted by Nolan through the point that you don’t really want to know how magic works, which he points out at the beginning of the film through Michael Caine. Nolan is for me one of the greatest film makers of non linear stories, memento, tenet, inception, are all great examples of this and this movie is no exception.  Overall I found it a bit confusing at first to tell at what part of the story we were at because of the non linearity, but I think this adds to the story. Once you really understand how it’s being told and how Nolan gives you the plot twist at the beginning of the film, it’s genius. The pledge, turn, the prestige, it all comes together, you understand it but it still gets you.  The rivalry that is created by Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman is excellent and it really feels personal and reaches a level of obsession that they are willing to risk their lives over it.  At the end it leaves you questioning yourself, and you realize it really was that simple for Borden, he has a twin brother and they live as one person, which is why it might be confusing on the first watch, but really unwinds once you know what’s going on, like with Sarah feeling like she was with a different person depending on the day which was true and showed the level both men were willing to go to achieve the spot of best magician.  Angier’s case is even more interesting, you are left questioning which is the real Angier, maybe it’s both. Do they know they are gonna die?  And like I said before, everything is foreshadowed by Nolan, the bird dying in the trick tells you everything you need to know, it tells you about Angier, Sarah tells you about Borden, it’s a trick hiding in plain sight and that’s what I think makes the film so great.  At the end you see Angier sacrificed his humanity, Borden sacrificed his identity. Both went all the way for greatness.