Before the feud: Jackman as Angier, Bale as Borden
“If your hate could be turned into electricity, it would light up the whole world.”
That quote is from Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), it’s not from the dialog spoken by David Bowie as Tesla in Christopher Nolan’s 2006 feature, The Prestige. But I think it summarizes what is wrong with the film, which was co-authored by Nolan’s brother and frequent collaborator, Jonathan. In brief, the action of the movie arises from nexus where science meets illusion, which is a fascinating avenue into metaphysics. But the science is little more than elaborate window dressing in what boils down to a melodrama about the all-consuming hatred between two illusionists the 1890s, Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale).
“White light could kill me now…”
I’m not a fan of reviews that say what filmmakers should have done. Better to judge artists on the choices that they did make in the writing, casting, production, etc., and how successful those choices were in the finished work. But The Prestige is particularly frustrating because the Nolan brothers are obviously talented men, and I’m convinced that they missed opportunities both large and small.
Let’s start with the science. They featured Nicola Tesla as a character, and added three stagecraft engineers, Cutter (Michael Caine) and Borden/Fallon (Christian Bale in a dual role), but none of them really add to the story, which, again, is ultimately about nothing more than a feud. It could be argued, I suppose, that Tesla and the engineers are an allegorical element: they reveal the reality behind illusion. But this movie doesn’t rise to either metaphysics or allegory.
Cutter cuts to the chase, using a body double.
Furthermore, the feud, which is so vicious that both men end up handicapped, is undermined by an elemental flaw in the plot. Angier is determined to duplicate Borden’s most phenomenal trick, teleportation (same as being beamed to another location in Star Trek). Angier’s engineer, Cutter, after seeing Borden perform it on stage, immediately and convincingly concludes that he uses a body double for the illusion. Angier stubbornly refuses to believe it, and at least two problems result:
Hugh No. 2, Gerald Root
(1) Less believable than any magic trick, ever, Angier is promptly presented with an exact lookalike of himself– Gerald Root, an underemployed and drunken actor who can be his body double until Angier figures out how to do teleportation. It’s silly, and disappointing except that it gives us a double-dose of Hugh Jackman. (2) Cutter was right all along, and I, for one, believed him all along. As a result, when Tesla actually invents of a kind of teleportation for Angier, it’s fantastical, but ultimately irrelevant to the outcome. (Also, if I may, a catty caveat about a small missed opportunity: When Tesla conducts his matter-beaming tests, he uses first an inanimate object, a top hat, then an animate one, a cat. As this is magic, why not a top hat and a rabbit?)
Hugh, jacked.
But back to the outcome. More disappointment. In the denouement, Angier confesses that his motivation all along was to bask in applause, so the whole feud boils down to Angier’s rolling-in-it ego vs. Borden’s consummate duplicity. The actual climax sinks to a horror-film tactic, with clones of Angier rotting in water tanks under the stage. That’s followed by a pat Hollywood ending, where the covetous Angier dies, the resentful Fallon is hanged, and Borden walks off with one of the two surviving females, his daughter. (Oh, yes, the women. Besides the daughter, there are three, two wives and a shared mistress. Both wives end up dead, and the mistress is so manipulated and betrayed by her lovers that she scrams.)
The cats and the hats: not transported, but duplicated
Another quote, one spoken in the film by Bowie as Tesla, suggests how good this movie might have been, if it had been more about ideas than emotions. Speaking as a scientist to a magician, he says, “Perhaps you’ll find more luck in your field, where people are happy to be mystified.” That is where a potentially fascinating film could have been found, in a story about how illusionists ultimately rely on science and engineering, and when the science is revealed, the result is the end of confusion and the dawn of enlightenment. Getting it completely backwards, The Prestige exploits science in the service of illusion.
Their subject was magic. I only wish the Mssrs. Nolan weren’t quite so guilty of misdirection.
Game of Consequences 
Misdirection
Before the feud: Jackman as Angier, Bale as Borden
“If your hate could be turned into electricity, it would light up the whole world.”
That quote is from Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), it’s not from the dialog spoken by David Bowie as Tesla in Christopher Nolan’s 2006 feature, The Prestige. But I think it summarizes what is wrong with the film, which was co-authored by Nolan’s brother and frequent collaborator, Jonathan. In brief, the action of the movie arises from nexus where science meets illusion, which is a fascinating avenue into metaphysics. But the science is little more than elaborate window dressing in what boils down to a melodrama about the all-consuming hatred between two illusionists the 1890s, Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale).
“White light could kill me now…”
I’m not a fan of reviews that say what filmmakers should have done. Better to judge artists on the choices that they did make in the writing, casting, production, etc., and how successful those choices were in the finished work. But The Prestige is particularly frustrating because the Nolan brothers are obviously talented men, and I’m convinced that they missed opportunities both large and small.
Let’s start with the science. They featured Nicola Tesla as a character, and added three stagecraft engineers, Cutter (Michael Caine) and Borden/Fallon (Christian Bale in a dual role), but none of them really add to the story, which, again, is ultimately about nothing more than a feud. It could be argued, I suppose, that Tesla and the engineers are an allegorical element: they reveal the reality behind illusion. But this movie doesn’t rise to either metaphysics or allegory.
Cutter cuts to the chase, using a body double.
Furthermore, the feud, which is so vicious that both men end up handicapped, is undermined by an elemental flaw in the plot. Angier is determined to duplicate Borden’s most phenomenal trick, teleportation (same as being beamed to another location in Star Trek). Angier’s engineer, Cutter, after seeing Borden perform it on stage, immediately and convincingly concludes that he uses a body double for the illusion. Angier stubbornly refuses to believe it, and at least two problems result:
Hugh No. 2, Gerald Root
(1) Less believable than any magic trick, ever, Angier is promptly presented with an exact lookalike of himself– Gerald Root, an underemployed and drunken actor who can be his body double until Angier figures out how to do teleportation. It’s silly, and disappointing except that it gives us a double-dose of Hugh Jackman. (2) Cutter was right all along, and I, for one, believed him all along. As a result, when Tesla actually invents of a kind of teleportation for Angier, it’s fantastical, but ultimately irrelevant to the outcome. (Also, if I may, a catty caveat about a small missed opportunity: When Tesla conducts his matter-beaming tests, he uses first an inanimate object, a top hat, then an animate one, a cat. As this is magic, why not a top hat and a rabbit?)
Hugh, jacked.
But back to the outcome. More disappointment. In the denouement, Angier confesses that his motivation all along was to bask in applause, so the whole feud boils down to Angier’s rolling-in-it ego vs. Borden’s consummate duplicity. The actual climax sinks to a horror-film tactic, with clones of Angier rotting in water tanks under the stage. That’s followed by a pat Hollywood ending, where the covetous Angier dies, the resentful Fallon is hanged, and Borden walks off with one of the two surviving females, his daughter. (Oh, yes, the women. Besides the daughter, there are three, two wives and a shared mistress. Both wives end up dead, and the mistress is so manipulated and betrayed by her lovers that she scrams.)
The cats and the hats: not transported, but duplicated
Another quote, one spoken in the film by Bowie as Tesla, suggests how good this movie might have been, if it had been more about ideas than emotions. Speaking as a scientist to a magician, he says, “Perhaps you’ll find more luck in your field, where people are happy to be mystified.” That is where a potentially fascinating film could have been found, in a story about how illusionists ultimately rely on science and engineering, and when the science is revealed, the result is the end of confusion and the dawn of enlightenment. Getting it completely backwards, The Prestige exploits science in the service of illusion.
Their subject was magic. I only wish the Mssrs. Nolan weren’t quite so guilty of misdirection.
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