Frank, I don't think Angier was fooling himself at all. I think he knew exactly what was going to happen as soon as he saw the cat and the hats. "Could I have my hat please?" "Which one Sir? They are all your hat."

I think he put the gun within reach because he knew he'd have to kill the double or deal with the consequences. He even said,"I wouldn't want to live that way."

Now, at first blush, with all the tension built up by Bowie and Serkis, one might have thought he meant that he didn't want some horrible fly-like creature to have to survive the experiment. But I don't think so. I think he knew full well what he was doing.

The one bit that has been a big flummoxed is the potential memory on the part of the doubles. If HE knew what he was doing from performance to performance...and they were exact duplicates (or on the chain of murder, they were duplicates of themselves), wouldn't they have enough knowledge to understand how they got up to the balcony? And yet, each seemed to have a vaguely stunned look.

On the other hand, if the underlying theme really was complete sacrifice in the service of revenge/competition, then I suppose, each of the doubles would have an exactly copy of the revenge plan in his head.

heavy

eta: Going back to the why were they surprised question, I wonder, too, about the look on the drowing copies' faces. Didn't they see it coming?

The Angier who drowned was the "original" and yes, he knew what was happening. I think he was surprised that it was so painful, because he'd based his act at least partly on Michael Caine's "drowning is like going home" comment at his wife's funeral. Oops...

But I also don't think "copy" is quite the right word -- they're both Angier, with all of his memories etc intact. Like on Farscape.

But because of the timing each time he steps out onto the balcony is the first time -- the one who did it last night is now dead. He only ever gets to be the prestige once.

[eta: Which is to say, yes, he understands how he got there, but I think he's still relieved/surprised every time it works, since it's always the first time.]

I completely agree that 'copy' is the wrong word. They are all him.

So, I guess that means that his memory stops at the drowning each night?

But, that can't be either, because he is dealing with the dead after every show. He MUST have some on-going memory, because he is taking the dead ones to the same place each time...and seeing that there is more than one, right?

This is the point at which I get stuck. Perhaps the book would shed some light on this.

Actually, scratch almost everything I said up there. The living Angier's memory will never include the drowning, because the survivor never has that experience. He does have the memory of being the prestige every night -- his memory goes from the Tesla machine to the balcony -- so I guess he's just always really happy to not be dead. I probably would be.

Ah. Very good point.

Still, what a weird thing to have to deal with. "Hey, there's a dead me here. Better come up with a plan. I know... I'll take it to this dodgy basement...hey LOOK, there are tons more of me..."

And the Angier who finally buys the farm, seems fairly clear on the entire concept.

Damn. I would have said that while I liked the movie, I probably wouldn't rewatch it. I guess now I'll have to. Le Sigh.

Oh, I assumed that the body-disposal plan was set up in advance. That's part of why he hired the blind stagehands in the first place -- even if they were tempted to look under the cover, they still wouldn't know what they were transporting.

So, like in Memento, he is somehow reminded of what to do?

Interesting. And leads me to the comment about only 100 performances. Okay, killing only 100 himselves, is pretty horrible. But I wonder if he hit on this notion because, in his original thinking, he couldn't imagine getting away with it for much longer. As it is, even with blind stage hands, it was quite a feat.

Right. The issue in question is answered by Angier's own statement, "I was never sure whether I would be in the prestige, or in the box." The answer of course is that he would be both, but that the dude in the prestige would get to diverge from the dude in the box, and never have to know what drowning feels like.

Really, if you've got any empathy at all, you should be able to understand that, if you would like not to drown every night, then the OTHER YOU would ALSO like not to drown every night. The real revelation, to me, was the final understanding that Angier was a worthless turd of a man, even aside from his crazy revenge plot, and deserved anything and everything Alfred -- or fate, or Wayne Brady -- could think of to do to him.

That was really it for me too. Jeebus.

We get shown, in a number of ways, how callous Borden was...toward his wife...toward his lover...in his thirst to 'win', etc. While Angier comes off all gentile and shit. In the end, it would seem that he was completely hollow. At first, I handwaved that away with the ptsd excuse after losing his wife. But he let his wife go into that tank every night! And even with the hubris of a magician knowing how the trick is supposed to work, that just seemed another brick in the wall of his self-serving nature.

Hmm, that brings up some interesting class issues in that Borden is a blatant Cockney (or at least lower-class - he SOUNDED Cockney to me, but I'm no expert), while Angier was a wealthy man "slumming" because he's addicted to the thrill of the audience.