The Prestige
[Warning: This post contains major spoilers...
Seriously, if you have not seen this movie then DO NOT read this post! It will ruin everything!]
The Prestige is an amazing movie because it keeps you guessing the entire time. And the best part? The solution is the simplest, and perhaps most obvious, one you could think of (especially if you are familiar with the ways of the old magicians) and yet the writers encourage you to dismiss such a simple solution at every turn. As the audience, we are taken on a journey along with Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman!) exploring the relationship between science and magic.
Angier, always trying to best his fellow magician Alfred Borden (Christian Bale...seriously, this cast is awesome!) wants to figure out how to make himself disappear from one place and appear in another, but he doesn't want to share the limelight with anyone else, so he goes to speak to the greatest "magician" he can find: Nicola Tesla. "But Tesla is a scientist!" you say. So did I. But remember the old adage: magic is simply science that we don't yet understand. Now, as this movie shows you, the magic of the illusionists is, in fact, mere trickery and diversion. For Angier, however, real magic is what Tesla deals in. This man is able to provide light to an entire village without flames that could die out or start fires. He can make it appear as though they have no power source simply by hiding the wires. For someone who has never seen such technology, this would appear to be magic. Nowadays, we all understand electrical currents, and so simple things like the light bulb lose their novelty.
This is where the movie steps into the realm of fiction to prove its point, but it is a point that is shockingly poignant, I think. Tesla cannot make teleportation possible...although I'm sure many of us wish he had because that seems so convenient. What the scientist does achieve is, essentially, magic. He can make an exact copy of anything, including Angier. Thus, though he cannot make the magician teleport, he can make it appear that way...and that's magic. That is what illusionists do, but he does it with technology.
The most interesting thing about Angier's trick is that it is foreshadowed in the very first scene as Cutter, an old illusionist, explains how to make a bird reappear. The simple answer? He doesn't! He uses a lookalike, just as Angier tries to do at one point. Unfortunately for the poor bird, however, his fate is worse than having to share the stage; in order to make the trick work, the first bird must die and be replaced by the second. And this is how Angier makes his trick work. He kills his clone so that he never has to share the spotlight or his life with anyone else. And he does it every night.
The answer to the real mystery has already been spelled out for you, and hopefully you have already seen the movie and you know how Borden makes it work. It's so simple. He has a lookalike, and it is his secret twin brother. They share a life, they share the stage, they take turns being Robert, while the other acts as a nobody. And the signs were always there, we were given the answer at the very beginning, and yet the clues are both so obvious and so misleading that we ignore them. As Sherlock so famously said, "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." When you realize that teleportation and cloning are out of the question, the solution is truly quite simple. Amazing, right?
Seriously, if you have not seen this movie then DO NOT read this post! It will ruin everything!]
The Prestige is an amazing movie because it keeps you guessing the entire time. And the best part? The solution is the simplest, and perhaps most obvious, one you could think of (especially if you are familiar with the ways of the old magicians) and yet the writers encourage you to dismiss such a simple solution at every turn. As the audience, we are taken on a journey along with Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman!) exploring the relationship between science and magic.
Angier, always trying to best his fellow magician Alfred Borden (Christian Bale...seriously, this cast is awesome!) wants to figure out how to make himself disappear from one place and appear in another, but he doesn't want to share the limelight with anyone else, so he goes to speak to the greatest "magician" he can find: Nicola Tesla. "But Tesla is a scientist!" you say. So did I. But remember the old adage: magic is simply science that we don't yet understand. Now, as this movie shows you, the magic of the illusionists is, in fact, mere trickery and diversion. For Angier, however, real magic is what Tesla deals in. This man is able to provide light to an entire village without flames that could die out or start fires. He can make it appear as though they have no power source simply by hiding the wires. For someone who has never seen such technology, this would appear to be magic. Nowadays, we all understand electrical currents, and so simple things like the light bulb lose their novelty.
This is where the movie steps into the realm of fiction to prove its point, but it is a point that is shockingly poignant, I think. Tesla cannot make teleportation possible...although I'm sure many of us wish he had because that seems so convenient. What the scientist does achieve is, essentially, magic. He can make an exact copy of anything, including Angier. Thus, though he cannot make the magician teleport, he can make it appear that way...and that's magic. That is what illusionists do, but he does it with technology.
The most interesting thing about Angier's trick is that it is foreshadowed in the very first scene as Cutter, an old illusionist, explains how to make a bird reappear. The simple answer? He doesn't! He uses a lookalike, just as Angier tries to do at one point. Unfortunately for the poor bird, however, his fate is worse than having to share the stage; in order to make the trick work, the first bird must die and be replaced by the second. And this is how Angier makes his trick work. He kills his clone so that he never has to share the spotlight or his life with anyone else. And he does it every night.
The answer to the real mystery has already been spelled out for you, and hopefully you have already seen the movie and you know how Borden makes it work. It's so simple. He has a lookalike, and it is his secret twin brother. They share a life, they share the stage, they take turns being Robert, while the other acts as a nobody. And the signs were always there, we were given the answer at the very beginning, and yet the clues are both so obvious and so misleading that we ignore them. As Sherlock so famously said, "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." When you realize that teleportation and cloning are out of the question, the solution is truly quite simple. Amazing, right?
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