Saw The Prestige last night, after having seen The Illusionist a month ago or so. Am remarkably meh on both of them, but much more so on The Prestige.

I also just saw The Prestige on Wednesday after seeing Illusionist a month ago or so. I guess I liked both about the same amount-- beautifully shot, engaging plotting, some nice lead roles-- but The Prestige never seemed to heighten the game. The stakes seemed exactly the same throughout the movie, so it all felt a little flat. I liked the way the plot worked out in Prestige though. It was satisfying even though we worked it out at some point midway through.

We saw The Prestige and The Illusionist with roughly the same interval between as you, Juliana. I thought The Illusionist was pretty bad, but compared to The Prestige, it was goddamn brilliant.

xpost - seems like a month is about the norm.

Sail and I saw The Illusionist (or was it The Prestige??) a month or so ago and were both very meh.

Though we did spend the next hour or so, each on our laptops, researching the Austro-Hungarian empire and WWI and stuff and calling the interesting bits back and forth. Muy Buffista.

(And FTR, Franz-Ferdinand's life - and death - would make a much more interesting movie than either of the above.)

I saw them in theatres pretty close together and preferred The Prestige, mainly for the cast. I spent the majority of both mentally willing the movie to GET ON WITH IT ALREADY AND STOP ACTING LIKE WE DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON BECAUSE WE FIGURED IT OUT AN HOUR AGO, GODDAMNIT.

The title made it seem so tacky, Corwood. But "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" was sweet, deep down, so I don't know why I am surprised.

Lotta word, Jessica.

But "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" was sweet, deep down, so I don't know why I am surprised.

This one's even sweeter, I think.

Okay. Watched Pan's Labyrinth last night, which was incredible.

Then watched Children of Men this morning, and was blown. A. Way.

I've watched the behind the scenes stuff, so now I know, but we were sitting there for the car sequence wondering aloud: HOW THE F@$% DID THEY GET THAT SHOT?????

Wow.

Very good point, bon.

Spoilers below for both movies:

I think what bothers me about both movies is that the magicians in question ruined lives willy-nilly in pursuit of their (IMNSHO negligible) goals. What bothers me more about The Prestige is Borden/Fallon leading the double/single life and devaluing the loves of the women in that life by that process (it drives his wife to suicide, for pete's sake) and Angier sending a man he knows to be innocent to the gallows, not to mention all the other Angiers' deaths. The casualness of the physical destruction they wreak upon each other also angered me. The repeated theme of "people don't look too closely, they want the illusion" didn't do anything to mitigate the horror of these personalities.

I guess I'm a little more able to forgive The Illusionist because of Uhl's obvious delight at being suckered. Still, Eisenheim is not a sympathetic character - a prince dies and Uhl is disgraced because Eisenheim wants to be with his lady love.

Really, I've come away from both movies in the firm belief that magicians are sociopathic, which is not necessarily the case.

I think part of my reason for being so offended is that magicians are close kin to stage performers (it is said that Angiers is the best stage performer), and I dislike seeing "my" world in such an evil light. But I also just despise the main characters of all three. Also, out of all three, I think Edward Norton was the most interesting to watch.

Herein ends my rant.

preferred The Prestige, mainly for the cast.

Yes, but as you said, nothing's going to beat the mental plotline of Ziggy Stardust helps Wolverine beat Batman using the AWESOME POWER OF ELECTRICITY.

I really liked The Prestige. Perhaps not working it all out (I had maybe 50% of it figured, and hadn't tied even that together right) helped. Yes, the magicians were cruel and horribly callous--working out exactly how horrible Borden was (since I hadn't worked out all of his doubling) when Angier had been portrayed as more mindless and offhandedly cruel up until the reveal was a big part of my enjoyment.

I didn't like any of the characters that much, but I liked looking at what they were doing.

Never mustered that much interest in The Illusionist.