You'll Like It, Not A Lot, But You'll Like It (Death Defying Acts (DVD))

Member Name: collingwood21

Product:	Death Defying Acts (DVD)
Date:	12/08/09 (94 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Guy Pearce and Saoirse Ronan, Good cinematography and set design

Disadvantages: Catherine Zeta Jones, No chemistry between leads, Lacks depth

"Death Defying Acts" (2008) - FILM ONLY REVIEW

Certificate: PG (UK, Ireland, USA)
Running Time: 97 minutes

The success, in quick succession, of magical-themed films "The Illusionist" and "The Prestige" seemed to establish that there is an audience for a specific type of period drama these days - namely one that revolves around entertainingly gimmicky suspense plots and handsome conjurors rather than the more common drawing room settings of historical drama. Following hot on the heels of these two films was "Death Defying Acts", Australian director Gillian Armstrong's film about Houdini that seemed on the surface to also be satisfying this niche market. However, lacking the other films' revenge-driven mystery, this movie instead showcases a mildly interesting romance and a little comedy that might have worked if it wasn't for the lack of chemistry between the leads and the comedy just not being all that funny. What it offers instead, however, is a real life illusionist rather than one from fiction, and that seems to be the hook by which the director has tried to get people to watch. A film about a magician having a romance does not sound that thrilling - but one about the great Houdini having a romance sounds like it has altogether much more potential.

Set against the backdrop of Harry Houdini's 1926 visit to Edinburgh, "Death Defying Acts" is a semi-fictional story that mixes Houdini's (Guy Pearce) genuine desire to use science to debunk psychic fraudsters with an imagined meeting between him and a local music hall medium Mary McGarvie (Catherine Zeta Jones). MacGarvie is a beautiful woman abandoned by her husband and struggling to support her young daughter Benji (Saoirse Ronan), who makes ends meet through a mixture of thievery and conning the gullible. When we first meet Mary, she has a scam in place to research the recently dead so that she can appear as an uncannily accurate medium at the local music hall; this is a time when spiritualism was incredibly popular, and audiences are easy to persuade of her clairvoyant talents. It is a fun start to the film, as we are in on the joke and know what is going on as the pair shamelessly manipulates their audience. However, when news arrives that Houdini will be offering a psychic challenge during his visit to the city - reveal the last words of his recently dead mother to prove there is an afterlife and win $10,000 - Mary and Benji naturally set their sights on winning the prize. They duly turn up to Houdini's auditions and Mary is of course chosen as "the one" to go through to the grand scientific test of her abilities - that this decision appears to be based on nothing more than the fact that she is easier on the eye that the other quacks and charlatans who turn up should give a strong hint as to where the story is starting to go from this point, as it gradually veers away from what was an interesting storyline about psychic powers and spiritualism into the realms of Hollywood-style fantasy.

The casting of this film was curious. Pearce was engaging as Houdini and gives a fine performance, giving him ample opportunity to show off the rippling muscles he has developed to play the legendary escapologist. Does he look like stocky man in his fifties, as Houdini would have been at this time? Well no, but as most people watching this film won't know what he looked like, Guy Pearce in a slightly dodgy wig is perfectly acceptable for this part. I was also very impressed with Saoirse Ronan, who gave an excellent performance and handled her new accent very well indeed - which is more than I could say for Catherine Zeta Jones. She seemed out of place in this film (more of a movie star than a real life character and hard to believe as someone in poverty) and she struggled to sound convincingly Scottish, with her accent crossing the Atlantic more times than the Queen Mary in the hour and a half that it was on. There was little chemistry between the leads, and while Timothy Spall did his best to provide comic relief as Houdini's long-suffering manager Sugarman, he didn't have the best of material to work with, unfortunately.

However, despite these obvious problems, this is a film that does look very good; the cinematography and set design is sumptuous and it recreates 1920s Edinburgh impressively well. To my eyes, historical accuracy seemed to be well observed in the sets and costumes, with perhaps the exception of Benji being routinely dressed in boys clothes for no apparent reason. This I expect is down to nothing more than it being standard these days for all heroines to be tomboys. There is also some fun to be had is watching the fraudsters trying to glean information from Houdini as to the likely words they are looking for to win the prize, but this fun is so often interrupted by stilted dialogue between the two stars that I was soon beginning to lose interest. It is hard to root for a relationship when it develops between a con artist and a married man.

All that said, this is a mildly entertaining film that can be enjoyed for being visually pleasing (both in the landscape and the leads), but which lacks depth and isn't as involving and exciting as it potentially could have been. Where "The Illusionist" and "The Prestige" both had impressive magical acts as part of their appeal, we view Houdini's world from the inside rather than from the audience's perspective, which means we see little stage magic. As Houdini's stage show would have largely have involved audiences watching a sealed box or velvet curtain for a sustained period while they waited for him to escape, this is perhaps no bad thing - although it would have been nice to see something a little magical in it. When the film was about spiritualism and being let in on the tricks of fraudsters it held my attention (though it may not have been so pleasing to one Derek Acorah, I think), but once standard movie romance conventions came into play, it gradually became less and less of a pleasure to watch. It was an interesting take on both Houdini's Edinburgh visit and on his passion with using science to unveil fraudsters, but it just drowns in romantic sludge and ultimately fails to be revived by an unexpectedly good final scene. Hardly a magical film.

Not recommended.

Summary: Watch "The Illusionist" instead