Now You See Me...Now You Don't / Film Review

 

Apologies for the grainy photo

    Last night, I went to see the third installment in the Now You See Me film franchise, which is basically just Fast & Furious but with magicians. It'd been 9 years since the previous film, so I was understandably excited for it. The first film ranks amorphously within my Top Ten favorite movies, and I did my media presentation this semester on the film, so I was definitely hyped to see Now You See Me: Now You Don't. As with the other movies in the franchise, this is one of those films where you know exactly what you're going to get. The reason these movies are so popular is because of the magic tricks. In the same way people go see Fast & Furious to see the newest cool stunts you can do with cars, people go see NYSM movies to see the newest cool magic tricks. My breakdown will be separated into four parts: the awesome, the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

    For a quick summary of the film: ten years after the Four Horsemen have disappeared into the ether, three young, up-and-coming magicians thrust themselves into the world of magic and team up with the resurfaced Horsemen (sent by the Eye, the supposed overlords of earthly magic) to take down a wealthy matriarch of a diamond company involved in money laundering. As the group dazzles their way around the cops, the full truth about the matriarch's family history threatens to come to light. 

    NYSM 3 returns all of the major characters from the previous two films---including 5 out of 6 Horsemen and Thaddeus Bradley, the former grandmaster of the Eye---except for Dylan Rhodes, the last Horsemen, who in the movie has been imprisoned in an inescapable Russian prison (he does make a cameo appearance at the end, though, to tease some new films in the years to come). 

THE AWESOME: 

    This was a fun movie. The magic tricks are once again well done, the quips are genuinely funny, the cast gels nicely, and the villain is memorable. There's a particular stretch of the film covering the heist of the MacGuffinish Heart Diamond from an auction in Belgium that I think is the strongest part of the film. The three younger actors hold their own with the absolutely stacked cast that are the Horsemen. The set design was pretty neat as well.

THE GOOD: 

    The opening scene was actually pretty ingenious, though I was kind of upset the Horsemen weren't actually present (I won't spoil it, in case you ever decide to watch it). Thematically, the film carries on the tradition of gaming the audience, inviting us to play along. They also bring back soundbites from the previous films---"the closer you look, the less you actually see." That kind of jazz. I liked the setting of an F1 race as the major third act set piece---it added a fair amount of kineticism to the closing act. Some of my favorite moments were actually when visual effects magic wasn't used at all (there was quite a lot of it) and the actors were legitimately doing sleight-of-hand, sleight-of-costume, and mentalism. 

THE BAD:

    The plot is just not there. All of the NYSM movie plots are basic, but there was a certain, almost ungainly gravitas to the previous two movies that just wasn't here in this one. The previous two movies had plots that felt like they were always building to something. The plot in this one is haphazard, poorly stitched together, and just did not work for me. It's a shame because Rosamund Pike plays an excellent villain, and she's given a lot to do, but what she actually does is mope around like a headless chicken aside from capturing the Horsemen at one point. Some of the dialogue was also off-point. Some scenes and tricks looked a little too crisp for my liking. I feel like we're entering the age of Hollywood where all the popcorn flicks that aren't Oscar-bait or IP-laden behemoths honestly look and feel the same. The vibe of NYSM 3 felt like it was made to show us some cool magic trick set pieces, throw in some funny Gen-Z jokes about crypto and AI, and plant the seeds for a rinse-and-repeat a couple years down the road. 

THE UGLY:

    

    I'll come out and say it. The plot twist sucked. I understand each of these movies needs a big ol' twist to keep the people happy, but I just didn't like it at all. It honestly undercuts the story they had crafted for the character who ends up being the mastermind behind it all. It also just came out of left field, making it incredibly jarring. Also, there really wasn't a third act of the movie. I was honestly shocked when it ended. I felt as if I had fallen asleep and missed a large section of the movie. The previous two movies felt cohesive and fluid and thus had an easy crescendo to follow. This movie's ending and twist came out of nowhere. The biggest gripe for me, however, was that the Horsemen were essentially sidelined in the movie to make way for the three younger magicians. This is all well and good for the sequels, but I wasn't exactly invested in their characters---I wanted to see my old pals from the previous movies kick some ass. Instead, they were portrayed as buffoons, punching bags, "uncs" having lost a step, and angry at each at other for a reason manufactured off-screen before the start of the film's timeline. I came to see the Horsemen do magic, but by the end of the movie, they weren't even the stars of their own main event. 

    Overall, I'm rating the film a solid 7 out of 10. Like I said, I knew what I was expecting, I was entertained by the stuff I was expecting, and I would definitely use another NYSM movie as an excuse to spend $11 on popcorn (which is absolutely absurd pricing). My only wish is that next time, please don't sideline the main characters of the movie. I know magic is hard, but it can't be that hard to live up to your star billing.