A good movie

I remember exactly when I watched this flick. I was on holiday in Paris at my sister’s and when we went to rent a movie. I saw this one and I told her we definitely should watch it. Back then, I was a huge fan of Edward Norton who was the best actor of his generation and I only heard very good things about the movie. Eventually, I think nobody really enjoyed it except myself… Personally, I thought it was pretty good but still, I can’t say it was really mind-blowing though. The point is that it was absolutely a very well made movie, the directing was solid, the costumes and sets looked really good and the cast did a very good job as well (Edward Norton ... Eisenheim, Paul Giamatti, Jessica Biel, Rufus Sewell). So, what was wrong with this movie then? In my opinion, I thought that the story was terribly bland and generic. It was entertaining but there wasn’t really a single moment when I was on the edge of my seat wondering what would happen next. A few years later, I would watch ‘The Prestige’ directed by Christopher Nolan and even though it was based on the subject, I thought Nolan’s outing was 100 times more entertaining than this movie. Eventually, it was unfortunately one of the many movies starring Edward Norton which ended up being either overrated or disappointing (‘The Bourne Legacy’, ‘Stone’, ‘Pride and Glory’, ‘The Incredible Hulk’, ‘The Painted Veil’, ‘Down in the Valley’, ‘The Italian Job’, ‘Red Dragon’, ‘Death to Smoochy’, ‘The Score’, …). Still, to conclude, even though I think it tends to be overrated, it remains a very well made and entertaining flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

7/10