REVIEW: NOW YOU SEE ME
Let me confess my full love of and practice of magic before I continue this review. Magic, well for me mostly card tricks, was a huge part of my life in fifth grade. I got my friends and I to pull them off, amazing (or at least slightly surprising) my peers and adults who were patient enough to tolerate as I carefully balanced where their card was going to be. I even performed a card trick (with a deck of Power Ranger cards, no less) for my sixth grade talent day. Of course, as seventh grade hit, puberty pulled off the evilest trick on me: making my love of card tricks disappear.
So I've always been enamored with magic, especially the act Penn & Teller, who aren't afraid to show you how some of their tricks are performed. Unlike Penn & Teller, or me at my sixth grade performance, "Now You See Me" doesn't blow you away with the big reveal. It leaves you confused and mad you sat down for such a long...trick.
The Hollywood dazzle, and product placements (I GET IT, SHE'S DRINKING A DIET PEPSI) are all there in "NYSM," about four talented magicians getting recruited by a mysterious force who wants them to unite for a common purpose. Right away the film has a flaw: Dave Franco, who plays magician Jack Wilder, is shown getting busted with a spoon-bending trick. It's somehow justified he's a good magician when he runs away with the wallet from the man who busted him, but even in the movie, his character is a second rate James.
Maybe that was a little harsh, but I felt bamboozled as the credits rolled. All the Horsemen, as their stage name is called, lack character development. Hold for the gorgeous Fisher, Eisenberg and Harrelson are competing to who can be the biggest jerk, though Harrelson walks away with the better role as a mentalist who can hypnotize people by slapping them in the chest. It sounds like a contradiction, but it's true. Ruffalo is passable as the man tracking down the Horsemen, but the movie picks up when "Batman" alums Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine appear in small roles. Caine's role is criminally cut short, but Freeman has a lengthier performance as a sort of MythBuster trying to debunk the Horsemen every step of the way.
Perhaps I'm getting antsy for the real summer stuff, like "Man of Steel" next week, but I'm just waiting for that summer blockbuster to grab my attention. "Now You See Me" isn't a totally pointless exercise of star power, but I would've loved to see it have more "oomph," instead of bountiful fluff to distract the audience.
Rating: 2/4 stars
So I've always been enamored with magic, especially the act Penn & Teller, who aren't afraid to show you how some of their tricks are performed. Unlike Penn & Teller, or me at my sixth grade performance, "Now You See Me" doesn't blow you away with the big reveal. It leaves you confused and mad you sat down for such a long...trick.
The Hollywood dazzle, and product placements (I GET IT, SHE'S DRINKING A DIET PEPSI) are all there in "NYSM," about four talented magicians getting recruited by a mysterious force who wants them to unite for a common purpose. Right away the film has a flaw: Dave Franco, who plays magician Jack Wilder, is shown getting busted with a spoon-bending trick. It's somehow justified he's a good magician when he runs away with the wallet from the man who busted him, but even in the movie, his character is a second rate James.
Maybe that was a little harsh, but I felt bamboozled as the credits rolled. All the Horsemen, as their stage name is called, lack character development. Hold for the gorgeous Fisher, Eisenberg and Harrelson are competing to who can be the biggest jerk, though Harrelson walks away with the better role as a mentalist who can hypnotize people by slapping them in the chest. It sounds like a contradiction, but it's true. Ruffalo is passable as the man tracking down the Horsemen, but the movie picks up when "Batman" alums Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine appear in small roles. Caine's role is criminally cut short, but Freeman has a lengthier performance as a sort of MythBuster trying to debunk the Horsemen every step of the way.Perhaps I'm getting antsy for the real summer stuff, like "Man of Steel" next week, but I'm just waiting for that summer blockbuster to grab my attention. "Now You See Me" isn't a totally pointless exercise of star power, but I would've loved to see it have more "oomph," instead of bountiful fluff to distract the audience.
Rating: 2/4 stars
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