Film Review: Now You See Me

Director: Louis Leterrier

The 2013 summer won't be remembered for blockbusters like last year will be, obviously The Dark Knight Rises was the most talked about movie but was edged into second place at the box office overall by The Avengers. Then the simply excellent first part of The Hunger Games rolled in and even some people seemed to like the latest James Bond installment Skyfall. Either way we were spoilt last year and this summer has really struggled to come close to any of the four films above but Now You See Me is a light hearted film that was hoping to surprise you with its clever plot, unfortunately it fails miserably on that count.

"The Four Horsemen"

Four magicians, Daniel Atlas (Eisenberg), Henley Reevers (Fisher), Merritt McKinney (Harrelson) and Jack Wilder (Dave Franco), are mysteriously brought together to perform tricks at big venues. Their first is to rob the local bank of a random person in the audience which they succeed in doing but their activities spark the interest of FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo). So they have to go underground in between shows whilst wondering who they mysterious sponsor is who brought them together.

A reasonably impressive cast tend to revert to their familiar roles in this film, Jesse Eisenberg plays a cheeky comedic type while Woody Harrelson plays his usual impatient and sarcastic self and Morgan Freeman also falls into this category. The early premise as to how they perform the tricks as well as the underlying story of who is paying them to do these stunts is certainly intriguing. It captures your interest from the opening scene but as the film develops the plot becomes less believable and with that less interesting.

Thaddeus Bradley  explaining the disappearing money trick

The film falls into the format of Morgan Freeman's character, Thaddeus Bradley who makes money revealing magicians secrets, explaining to the FBI and the audience how they managed their tricks. In the early part its reasonably clever although possibly predictable but as the film moves towards its conclusion the explanations are utterly preposterous. Then it runs into the typical action movie with a car chase scene which is as monotonous as every other one you've seen in an action movie before. Many questions are left unanswered by the end of the film and with the announcement over a sequel happening that probably explains why.

1.5/4 Possibly enjoyable if you don't take the plot too seriously