For weeks, the cinema chain I pay
my £14.99 to each month for unlimited movies has been teasing its clientele
with the promise of a Secret Unlimited Screening. This one off, top secret
screening would be open, free of charge to anyone with an Unlimited Card but
the film was to be kept a secret. All we knew was that it would be a 12A
Certificate movie and that it was being screened, across the country for one
night only at 8:30pm, long ahead of its UK theatrical release. The
brilliant marketing behind the scheme insured excitement, anticipation,
discussion and a full cinema on a Monday evening for a movie which turned out
to be Now You See Me. My initial
reaction was one of slight disappointment as I was hoping for something like Pacific Rim which
hadn’t been released anywhere else in the world for the selfish reason that a
review would drive more traffic to this very page. I’d heard a couple of good
things about Now You See Me from the
States though so eagerly settled in for the next two hours.
Now you See Me is a heist movie in the vague style of the Oceans movies in that someone (a
mastermind whose identity is unknown), draws together a group of experts in
their fields to carry out heists on an epic scale. The difference here though
is that the individuals chosen aren’t safe crackers, getaway drivers,
contortionists or Matt Damon but are magicians. Their heists will involve magic
and illusion to steal from banks and companies chosen by their puppet master.
On the trail of the magicians is FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) who is
teamed, much to his disliking, with Interpol agent Alma Dray (Melanie Laurent).
Together the pair chases magicians Daniel (Jesse Eisenberg), Merritt (Woody
Harrelson), Henly (Isla Fisher) & Jack (Dave Franco) across the United States
from show to show, always remaining two steps behind their cunning and
trickery.
