Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Mélanie Laurent, Jesse Eisenberg
Four great magicians; J. Daniel Atlas (Eisenberg), Merritt
McKinney (Woody Harrelson), Henley Reeves (Isla Fisher) and Jack Wilder (Dave
Franco) join forces to form an act known as The Four Horsemen and perform a
lavish act in Las Vegas. One night as a finale, the group perform a trick
seemingly teleporting an audience member (José Garcia) into a Parisian bank and
then teleporting the large sum of money back. Naturally, the FBI are intrigued
and as The Four Horsemen continue to perform similar tricks, agents Dylan
Rhodes (Ruffalo) and Alma Dray (Laurent) try to solve the mysteries behind the
group’s illusions.
Now You See Me is a film that is in some ways much like a
magic trick. There’s a lot of flash and extravagance, but it’s just eye candy
for what is essentially something bare-bones underneath. There’s something
ambitious about Now You See Me. The entire presentation style is slick and
stylised, whilst the film also boasts an all-star cast (including Morgan
Freeman and Michael Caine) and the film also spins a complex story, the film
completely overpowers everything with its hyper-visual and often wholly
illogical imagery (such as lighting displays projected onto buildings that give
a sense of 3D depth). It’s all light and noise and underneath the characters
aren’t very well explored. Mark Ruffalo makes a fine performance and Woody
Harrelson is pretty much a dead cert for a good performance in anything, but
Harrelson is pushed into the background and Dave Franco despite being part of
the central group of four magicians almost might as well not be in the film his
character is so often over-shadowed. The film might be worth a second viewing
because the nature of its plot lends itself to dissection and deconstruction,
but Now You See Me is more style than
substance.
Now You See Me goes on wide release in the UK on the 3rd of July.
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