The Prestige (2009)

The Prestige is a psychological thriller film directed by Christopher Nolan about a deadly feud between two magicians named Angier and Borden. ¹

Something I really like about the movie is how thematically strong and interlinked its various themes were. These themes show up repeatedly in different ways, which I like. ¹

The story also has moments of recontextualization, which I love. For example, we learn at the end of the movie about how Borden had a secret twin, which was the way they could do the teleporting man trick in the first place. This revelation changes our interpretation of many prior events, creating an explanation for lots of “magical” events in the story including: ¹

• Why Borden sometimes loved his wife and at other times loved his mistress.
• Why Borden’s hand wound had trouble healing (because his twin had to sustain the same wound at a later time).
• Why Borden literally did not know which knot he tied (because his twin tied it).
• Why Borden was able to get into Olivia’s home after escorting her (because his twin was inside).

Themes

Good tricks are deadly

At the beginning of the movie, we learn that the magician’s tricks are seen as mundane unless the magicians can introduce some element of death to their tricks. In particular, this is best exemplified in the scene where Borden is performing in a bar. At first, he’s doing a simple trick where seemingly solid iron rings are interlinked, to which the audience boos and throws things at him. However, the audience immediately becomes interested when he escalates to asking the audience to shoot a gun at him so he can catch the bullet. The audience does not want to see tricks that don’t somehow involve a risk of death. ¹

We see this in other places too: ¹

• The bird trick involves having multiple birds and killing one of them by flattening the cage.
• Angier’s improved teleporting man involves killing the original.

Man in the box

There’s this idea that no one cares about the man in the box appears many times throughout the story: ¹

• When Angier uses a double for the teleporting man trick, everyone applauds the double and not him.
• When Angier taunts the imprisoned Borden, he makes a show of saying that he doesn’t care about how Borden actually did his teleporting man trick and rips up the explanation.
• When Borden kills Angier, he doesn’t care about the dead clones in the water tanks, and doesn’t think of it as a sacrifice.

Footnotes

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