NOW YOU SEE ME = Cinematic Magic?

Hello, WORLD!!! Smokkee here, continuing to play catch up on all of my movie reviews. If you know anything about me, you know I've been disappointed by most of the movies that have been released in 2013. There's only a handful that truly stand out with STOKER being my favorite 2013 movie up to this point. I can now add  NOW YOU SEE ME to this list too. I don't know what it is about magician movies but most are pretty good. THE ILLUSIONIST starring Edward Norton and THE PRESTIGE with Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale were both great.

NYSM starts off by introducing us to four magicians: Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg), Merritt McKinley (Eisenberg's ZOMBIELAND co-star Woody Harrelson), Henly Reeves (Isla Fisher) & Jack Wilder (Dave Franco) showcasing their unique brands of illusion. Each receives a mysterious Tarot card that leads them to an apartment and allows them to meet each other, although there's some kind of past history between Daniel and Henly. After their initial meeting, the film fast forwards to one year later in Las Vegas where the 4 performers are headlining a show as the Four Horsemen, with their benefactor Arthur Tressler, the man who sponsors the quartet, watching from the audience. Tresslrr is played by Michael Caine, who's just as great as always here. And also in the audience is Thaddeus Bradley, a former magician who may hold the key to the grand finale of the Horseman's show. Bradley is played with a smarmy to a tee attitude by Morgan Freeman. The grand finale to end this show, which we find out is the first of three, is they rob a bank...in Paris! Interesting, right?

 Enter FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) who is teamed up with Interpol agent Alma Vargas to figure out how they do it and what could they possibly do for encores at their next two shows... 

I loved this movie until the end. I walked out the theater still liking this movie but not as much as I thought I would when it ended. Also, you never really get to know any of these characters nor do you care about them. For one brief second, this movie appeared to be heading to greatness but that too was an illusion. Not bad but coulda been way better. It's definitely worth viewing.

B-

Later, WORLD!