I was super psyched to see this movie after the trailers were shown a couple months ago, it’s magicians robbing banks for the poor. Director Louis Leterrier (Transporter 1 &2, Clash of the Titans, The Increidble Hulk)had a lot of attention towards the visuals like he usually does. The lights, cinematography, quick editing, all of which flowed with the film. But the content was lacking for me, and the trick of misdirection was placed within the wrong context of the film.
In terms of content, the film tended to drag out information and scenes throughout the movie. At least until the ending, which seemed rushed due to the 110 minutes of plot with the remaining 5 minutes expected to wrap everything up. It spent a lot of time speeding up or ignoring aspects that I would have liked been further explored, or hyper focused on areas that the audience picked up on the first time around. It felt like Leterrier was holding my hand by repeating the same plot points rather than trust that the audience has a linear thought process capable of remembering events and people mentioned 20 minutes ago.
We had Jesse Eisenberg co-star with Woody Harrelson, Isla Fisher and Dave Franco as the films “anti” heroes, The Four Horseman. Jesse Eisenberg basically played the same character as Zuckerberg in The Social Network, just spoke a little quicker and had a dash of facial hair included. Dave Franco, Isla Fisher and Woody Harrelson played the same characters they usually play in movies as well, just this time with illusions. Which lead me to think they were either very good at portraying their designated roles, or the writers got lazy and just wrote the characters for actors. All in all the 4 were likable characters, and I did enjoy a lot of their dialog and presentation. Which is a problem, because if they were to be the protagonist, that would mean that Mark Ruffalo’s FBI agent character was the antagonist. Thing being, we are led to like Ruffalo’s pig headed character and his relationship with his temporary Interpol colleague played by Melanie Laurent.
When you’re rooting for both characters to succeed, the film gets conflicting. On one hand, I want the 4 horseman to continue their bank robbing antics for the poor. On the other, I have slightly more freckles and an invested concern for the goals of the law enforcement agents. That and the scattered empty plot points, rushed scenes countering the molasses-y paced ones. Forced relationships and romantic tensions that really served no key to the plot felt as rushed as the ending itself. Off topic, but I am kind of impressed how Dave Franco managed to be a side character in the movie he was supposedly a co star in. That’s some real movie magic.
For the good, I truly enjoyed the characters interactions with each other. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman got together like milk and cookies, and Eisnebergs quick dialog with Harreslon were well timed and comedic. A lot of the Horseman’s performances tied in with the characters personalities very well, and the scenes where Franco isn’t in the background are very action packed and were the most fun to watch. The on purpose cinematic illusions were pretty cool, especially in the beginning of the movie.
The intro set the stage very well for the movie I thought, and the mildy type cast actors played their roles accordingly. It was just the many little aspects that gave me a bad taste in my mouth. At the end of the night, I gave it a 5.5/10. Don’t expect it to be like it’s magical predecessors like The Illusionist or The Prestige, the loose ends aren’t so much tied up as just lazily wrapped around the audiences expectation. The good moments were good and fun, the not so good were hyper focused. But one thing I can tip my hat to, hardly any real awful magica puns. So there’s that at least.