“The more you look, the less you see”
The Four Horse Men return in this film of magic, mis-direction, and intrigue. The setup was similar to the first movie, but beginning with the Horsemen now in hiding after the events of the their last trick. The addition of Lizzy Caplan’s, Lula, to the cast, replacing at least temporarily Isla Fisher’s character from the first movie, was a great addition. She fit in well with the group, despite the initial reactions from the other members.
I’m actually quite glad I hadn’t seen the trailer, as there was a couple of nice surprises there when I watched tonight. The first being the additon of Sanaa Lathan’s character in the FBI. I’ve always thought she was a good actress, while t
his doesn’t give her a lot to do; she does play the role really well.
The interactions between her character, and Mark Ruffalo’s, Dylan were really well played out. Two actors played nicely off each other.
The other big introduction to this, I guess we can now say, franchise; is Daniel Radcliffe, of Harry Potter fame. I must say he gets better as an actor as he gets older. The role suit him really well, and it looked; at least to me. Like he really got into it. Most of the scenes with him revolved around working with Michael Caine, in a re-appearance from his role in the first movie. The plot of the movie works, for the most part, around them.
Overall, I don’t feel like this movie was quite as clever, as the first one. But I didn’t see how you could top that anyway. For the most part, the magic, and tricks, and the way they did everything in the first one hadn’t been done in that way before. So for the most part it was a surprise. With this one, if you saw the first then you knew what to look for. There are some twists and turns that jump it away from what I think most people would think towards, but for the most part you can see the structure. Just don’t look too hard, because as the saying goes, “The more you look, the less you see”.
To quote, Thaddeus Bradley, “Want to know how they did it? Just say the magic word.”
In finishing, I would give this a solid 7.5 out of 10.
So, go watch it and tell me what you think, and remember,
“First rule of magic: always be the smartest person in the room.”
Dreaming Screenwriter 