Film Talk: Looking Back – Merciless magicians in The Prestige

Box office smashes featuring Hogwarts and Hobbits dominated the silver screen, and even our TV sets were wrapped in a cloak of sorcery, with hits including the BBC’s Merlin bringing a dose of magic directly into our homes.

However, during this golden age of wizards, witches and whomping willows, there was a cinematic exploration of a different kind of magic. Like all the best stage tricks, it was handled with the utmost dexterity, calculation and showmanship, and by a man who has proven himself as nothing less than a modern-day movie magician.

Following the success of 2005’s Batman Begins, director Christopher Nolan went on to explore the darkness of a different kind of world – that of late 1800s stage magic.

Based on the 1995 novel of the same name, 2006’s The Prestige follows the intertwining lives and careers of two Victorian magicians, who, following a tragedy, find themselves caught in an endless game of competition where the stakes are – fittingly – raised beyond belief.

Said stage rivals are played to perfection by Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman, who together perfectly convey the irresistible draw of the world of magic to a pair of men from entirely polarised backgrounds.

Alfred Borden (Bale) is a working class magician’s ‘shill’ – or audience stooge – with a knack for the technical aspects of magic, but a novice’s skill in showmanship.

Meanwhile, Robert Angier (Jackman) is a fellow shill with hidden aristocratic roots and a flair for performance.

While working for a London magician along with Angier’s wife Julia (Piper Perabo) and stage engineer John Cutter (a naturally sublime Michael Caine), both men serve as stooges and stage hands while absorbing their employer’s craft.

However, when Borden is blamed for a trick malfunction that leads to Julia’s death, resentment and the need for revenge lead he and Angier into a deadly duel of one-upmanship, which escalates as the two go on to pursue their own careers in the spotlight.

Each of them begins to find success, but when Borden stuns audiences with the creation of a seemingly impossible trick, Angier’s obsession with learning its secret and topping his rival leads both men on a journey of darkness and illusion that is far from confined to the stage.

With the film’s structure mirroring its suggested ‘three acts’ of a magic trick, the majority of The Prestige stands as an intricate piece of cinema designed to misdirect the viewer from the revelations of its concluding third.

Its period setting is used to provide a fittingly entrancing backdrop throughout, and is used in combination with costume and lighting to simultaneously encapsulate the glamourous yet somewhat sinister nature of the Victorian stage magic scene.

With consummate leading performances from Jackman and Bale, and fantastic supporting work from an array of talent including Caine, Scarlett Johansson and the late David Bowie, the film serves to captivate, mystify and surprise its audience in true tribute to the world it portrays.

Once again Christopher Nolan delivers a dark and compelling take on a theme with which we all believe we are familiar. Then – like any true magician – he bends the rules to create entertainment perfection.