The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen podcast – The Prestige

The Prestige

Podcast: The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen
Date: 6 November 2026
Hosts: Stephen Fenech & Trevor Long

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[00:01:43] Stephen Fenech: Hello and welcome to The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen, our movie podcast where Trevor Long, my co-host, watches a movie for the very first time. Yep, that’s the plan. My name’s Stephen Fenech. I’m the movie nerd who’s seen all these movies before and handpicked them each week to allow Trevor to see them for the very first time, and you might even be seeing them for the very first time as well. Trev, welcome. Great to be here. This week we’ve got a beauty, The Prestige, uh, written and directed by Christopher Nolan, released in 2006. Uh, this is the second movie in recent times we’ve had a 20-year anniversary. Oh, okay. I think Little Miss Sunshine was same, same, uh, a few weeks ago. This film stars Aussies— Australia’s very own Hugh Jackman. Yes. And Christian Bale. Pretty good cast. Now it’s based on a novel.

[00:02:38] Trevor Long: Okay.

[00:02:38] Stephen Fenech: A novel written by Christopher Priest published in 1995. Now there was a bit of competition around the novel for people to adapt it to the screen.

[00:02:47] Trevor Long: Right, okay.

[00:02:48] Stephen Fenech: First person who put their hand up to adapt it was Sam Mendes. Sam Mendes was just coming off American Beauty. And he thought, I wanna make this. American Beauty had a ton of Oscar nominations. Yeah, we’ve done it. And there was another production company, Newmarket Films, had also made an offer on behalf of Christopher Nolan. Now, Christopher Priest, the author, he decided, okay, he was ready to go with Mendez.

[00:03:22] Trevor Long: Right.

[00:03:25] Stephen Fenech: But what happened, what they did, Nolan said, sent out a VHS copy of his film, Nolan’s film Following, which came out in 1998. And on the strength of that film, he thought, I like this movie, I’m gonna go with Nolan.

[00:03:42] Trevor Long: Right, so he literally submitted a demo tape essentially.

[00:03:44] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, so Nolan said, here’s another movie I’ve made. And this was before Memento. Memento came out in 2000. So Memento was in post-production at the time. So Memento stars Guy Pearce. I’ll talk about that in a minute too. And he decided, you know what? Priest decided, I’m going to go with Nolan.

[00:04:02] Trevor Long: Nice.

[00:04:02] Stephen Fenech: So he said, but he also thought that because Nolan had only made one film at that point, he says, I’m supporting an emerging filmmaker. And wasn’t he right? Didn’t he pick that one?

[00:04:11] Trevor Long: Yeah, that’s the thing. When you said to me Christopher Nolan, I’m thinking, okay, so this is going to be some wacky, because I’ve heard all the very quintessentially Nolan things about his career in the last little bit. And I expected something different because of that. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Really got in early.

[00:04:25] Stephen Fenech: He did. And he backed the right horse too. Not that Sam Mendes had a great career, of course, but he’s done pretty well here. Now, Christopher Nolan, the structure of this film, and when we get into the run-through, you’re going to see that there’s plenty of time shifts. It goes back and forth and forward and back in the whole timeline. But when you look at it, the structure of the film is divided into— in the film, they decide the three stages of an illusion. Yes. And the structure of the movie is actually like that as well. When you’re— when on the number of times I’ve seen it, it really is— I’ve confirmed that it is right this time. The pledge, the turn, and the prestige, what they talk about, and the movie is structured like that. Yes. So there’s a promise, there’s the— there’s the— there’s the trick, and then there’s the payoff, which is the prestige. And that’s what we see in the movie. Now, the original choices for the film weren’t Hugh Jackman, right, and wasn’t Christian Bale. Okay, okay. The original choices were Jude Law and Guy Pearce.

[00:05:28] Trevor Long: Okay, another Aussie.

[00:05:29] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, Guy Pearce had just worked with Nolan on Memento, which will do. It’s a classic movie. It’s a really popular film in terms of its structure. Then when you realize how it was structured, the film actually works backwards is how it comes out in the end anyway. Sure. They decided that the, the, there was an opposition from Warner Brothers saying we don’t want Guy Pearce. This, this Warner Brothers executive said, did I don’t like Pearce. And Guy Pearce himself is on record saying he reckons his performance in Memento, which I thought was amazing, he thought, oh, that was subpar. So he, this is his quote, is, yeah, it came crashing down. I know why I didn’t work with Chris again. It’s because I’m no good in Memento. Wow. But he’s actually really good in Memento. So anyway, he didn’t get it. Um, someone else came in and cast Jude Law in another show, and they end up going with Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman. Now, had you any impressions of this movie? Had you heard of it, mate? Anything?

[00:06:38] Trevor Long: I’m a Hugh Jackman fan, right? My daughter loves The Greatest Showman.

[00:06:42] Stephen Fenech: Yes.

[00:06:42] Trevor Long: Uh, I’d never heard his name associated with a movie like this, let alone this title. So no, this is— I’m blindsided by this movie.

[00:06:51] Stephen Fenech: All righty, so the movie nominated for 2 Oscars.

[00:06:56] Trevor Long: Okay. And not— I guess—

[00:06:57] Stephen Fenech: yeah, okay, screenplay? No.

[00:06:59] Trevor Long: Ah, that’s disappointing because I think it’s—

[00:07:01] Stephen Fenech: well, 2 nominations, they didn’t win. And no acting— with no acting or directing categories. It was, uh, they were nominated for Best Cinematography.

[00:07:09] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:07:10] Stephen Fenech: And nominated for Best Art Direction. Lost both to Pan’s Labyrinth.

[00:07:15] Trevor Long: Okay, yeah.

[00:07:16] Stephen Fenech: Now Roger Ebert, our man, 3 out of 4 stars. But I’ve got to say, I’m only going to read you one paragraph of his review because the review is just basically a retelling of the story.

[00:07:25] Trevor Long: All right, so I don’t want to—

[00:07:26] Stephen Fenech: I don’t want to go into there. But here’s what he said: What you learn in the movie is, I believe, a disappointment. Nothing but a trick about a trick. With a sinking heart, I realized that The Prestige had jumped the rails and that rules we thought were in place no longer applied. But he still gave it 3 3 out of 4 stars.

[00:07:45] Trevor Long: I’m very disappointed by that.

[00:07:46] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, so he’s sort of saying that it was Roger and I drifting apart. Yeah. Anyway, this is your last exit before the freeway. We’re gonna really dive deep into the magic of this movie, uh, and if you haven’t seen The Prestige, you can catch it on Fetch.

[00:08:03] Trevor Long: You can catch it on Fetch along with thousands of other movies as well as TV streaming, you name it. Free-to-air TV is available on your Fetch device. You can pause, rewind, and record live TV on the Fetch Mighty. Simply connect your TV to an antenna antenna to enjoy digital streams of the free-to-air channels without an aerial. You can also get that through the internet, so it’s, it’s one for everyone. It’s fantastic. Plus all the free TV apps as well— ABC iView, SBS On Demand, 7+, 9Now, and 10. They’re all there. Then there’s premium channel packs. If you’re looking for more entertainment, you can add Fetch channel packs with 5 different channel packs to choose from. There’s something to keep everyone entertained, from kids to sports to drama, comedy, documentaries, and news. The Fetch channel packs have it all, and there are over 40 different channels available for you to watch. ESPN, BBC Earth, HGTV, Discovery, Oxygen, so many more. Plus the TV store, so there’s TV programs you can rent and buy, like Mr. Inbetween. That’s well worth watching. I really enjoyed that show. So download that and watch it on your Fetch box. You can get Fetch from affiliate partners like Optus through Telstra. You can get it directly from FetchTV.com today and at major retailers.

[00:09:11] Stephen Fenech: All right, you have now watched The Prestige. Give us a— share with us your first impressions. Was it what you expected? Unexpected?

[00:09:21] Trevor Long: I— this is the thing, you told me last week magic, um, so I knew I was getting a show about magic, but I don’t know what I expected from magic. Um, it had— this is weird— it— all I could watch was The Greatest Showman with this because I have seen it a couple of times with my daughter, and so it felt very Hugh Jackman. Like, I can’t see anyone but Hugh Jackman playing that role because he’s a performer. And if you’re talking about The Greatest Showman, yeah, The Greatest Showman his stage shows, like he’s a performer. I don’t see Hugh Jackman as an actor. I know Wolverine and all that, but I see him as a performer. And so he fitted this perfectly for me because he played a performer. Like I liked that part of it, but I didn’t know what the movie was about. So I was entranced by— I did tell you a rivalry.

[00:10:05] Stephen Fenech: Remember I said a rivalry? Correct, yeah.

[00:10:06] Trevor Long: So I was entranced through the movie. It had me captivated from start to finish is all I’ll say now.

[00:10:12] Stephen Fenech: Great, awesome.

[00:10:13] Trevor Long: And I’ll leave my thoughts to the end.

[00:10:15] Stephen Fenech: Sure, and it’s your social media post here.

[00:10:18] Trevor Long: A movie about magic? Yeah, I’ll watch that. But The Prestige is so much more. In some ways, it’s a work of magic in and of itself. If you’ve never seen it, I have to say, watch it. You won’t be disappointed.

[00:10:30] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, it was released in Australia on November 16th, 2006. I was there. I watched the movies.

[00:10:37] Trevor Long: Right on the 20th anniversary of this puppy. Wow.

[00:10:39] Stephen Fenech: We watched it. I watched the movies, uh, and my most recent rewatch was on 4K disc.

[00:10:45] Trevor Long: Nice.

[00:10:46] Stephen Fenech: 4K. Uh, cast: Christian Bale plays Alfred Borden, and he was in American Psycho, which I loved and we’ve done. The Dark Knight—

[00:10:56] Trevor Long: love the way you say you loved.

[00:10:57] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, you didn’t like it. You, you had something wrong with you there. Uh, The Dark Knight, which we’ve done, which is good. The Fighter, which we’re gonna do. I think you won an Oscar for this movie. Uh, Ford v Ferrari, which— yeah, we’ve seen that. No, we haven’t done it. You’ve seen it though, because it’s about cars. Of course. Uh, Hugh Jackman plays Robert Angell. He was in X-Men, The Greatest Showman, Van Helsing, and Swordfish. Swordfish, John Travolta, Halle Berry. Not a bad, not a bad show. Okay, which will— it’ll, it’ll make this— it’ll make our list.

[00:11:28] Trevor Long: It’s a long way down the list is what I mean.

[00:11:29] Stephen Fenech: Michael Caine plays Cutter. He was in Batman Begins. He’s a real, um, worked a lot with, with Christopher Nolan.

[00:11:37] Trevor Long: Can I make an early point?

[00:11:39] Stephen Fenech: Yes.

[00:11:39] Trevor Long: Um, Please, can we just do a Michael Caine marathon?

[00:11:43] Stephen Fenech: Sure.

[00:11:44] Trevor Long: And this is going to sound crazy because, you know, I’m not a movie guy. Yeah, but I’m a massive Michael Caine fan and have been as a child. Yeah, I just love Michael Caine. Yeah, he’s a brilliant actor. I would watch anything he’s in.

[00:11:56] Stephen Fenech: 100% agree. Well, if I’ll— I think I might have recommended a series, a little— it’s like a little mini 2-episode miniseries about Jack the Ripper, which he’s in. He plays Detective Abberline. Watch that and you’re welcome. Right, yeah. Batman Begins, he was in Victory with Sylvester Stallone, that was a movie he made a little while ago. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels opposite Steve Martin, which we’ll get to as well. And he was in Interstellar, which we’ve done, remember? And that’s a Christopher Nolan movie.

[00:12:25] Trevor Long: Yeah, wow.

[00:12:26] Stephen Fenech: Uh, Rebecca Hall plays Sarah. Now, did you recognize her from The Town? Remember the movie, the Ben Affleck movie? She was the girl they kidnapped at the start of the movie, remember? And then he fell in love with her, remember that? Okay. She was also in Vicky Cristina Barcelona opposite Scarlett Johansson, who’s in this as well. Uh, she was also in Godzilla v. Kong. Scarlett Johansson plays Olivia. She was in Lost in Translation opposite Bill Murray. She was in The Avengers, and recently she was in Jurassic World: Rebirth, which is, you know, it’s a bad movie. Okay. Uh, David Bowie. Did you recognize David Bowie? You never— did you not know that was David Bowie?

[00:13:05] Trevor Long: Who’s David Bowie in this?

[00:13:06] Stephen Fenech: You were watching him for 2 hours, mate. You didn’t recognize it was David Bowie. He played Nikola Tesla. The guy who made the machine.

[00:13:13] Trevor Long: I did not see David Bowie in it.

[00:13:15] Stephen Fenech: Well, he was in Labyrinth, he was in Zoolander, and The Man Who Fell to Earth. I can’t believe you didn’t know that was David Bowie. Wow. Are you a Bowie fan? Are you aware of him as a musician? Mate, I’m looking at him. He’s no longer with us, unfortunately.

[00:13:27] Trevor Long: Mate, the moustache, the hair. Nah, I wouldn’t have picked it.

[00:13:31] Stephen Fenech: He’s got a blue eye and a green eye. Do you know this? Mate, I don’t see people’s eye color.

[00:13:34] Trevor Long: Don’t ask me what color your eyes are, mate. I’ve never looked.

[00:13:37] Stephen Fenech: Okay, they’re brown for the record. He did good. They’re brown. Yeah, he did very well. Yeah, it’s great. I’ve got some other, some other facts about him as well. Okay, uh, before we get to the top things, let’s have a chat about Hisense. And you know what, if you want the big screen experience, yes, they’ve got their 100-inch TVs and all of those, but go to have a look at the XR10. You want a big screen? You want— you reckon that’s, that’s not a screen? This is a screen. The XR10 can go up to 300 inches. If you’ve got that sort of room in your house please invite me over because it’s a big— that’s a big screen.

[00:14:10] Trevor Long: I think I measured it once. You need a mezzanine.

[00:14:12] Stephen Fenech: Yes, you do. It’s more than one side of your house. Yeah, it’s, it’s two levels of height.

[00:14:17] Trevor Long: That’s a lot.

[00:14:18] Stephen Fenech: Well, I got it in my 150-inch screen in my theater and worked a treat. Great resolution, lots of film modes as well. You can choose, you know, your standard, dynamic, cinema day, cinema night. And what impressed me was the brightness— 600 ANSI lumens of brightness, which means you could watch this with the lights on. Well, you can watch this during the day. Yeah, it is that bright. Not only does it look great, 4K resolution, you still get the same interface that you see, the Vida interface with your TV, so you can stream Netflix. And it’s like just using a normal television. Yep. And, and if you want to connect your sources, you can connect to PlayStation or Xbox, put it in there, uh, and you’re, and you’re away. Audio-wise, you’ve got the Devallier speakers, so tuned by Devallier, which is a top audio brand. So you’ve got an all-in-one package here that offers remarkable quality to to really enjoy that big screen experience. Whether you’ve got a dedicated room or you want to carry this around your house, it’ll tick all of those boxes. It’ll suit all of those users and give you a tremendous viewing experience. Bring, bring the cinema experience to your home with the Hisense XR10. You can check it out at hisense.com.au. All right, now before we get into it, I just want to point out the fact that, as you discovered, there are several timelines going on here. So what we see at the start—

[00:15:39] Trevor Long: I’ll tell you this straight away, it bugged me for the first half of the movie. Yeah, because I’m like, whoa, where are we jumping back? It’s a lot of jumping back. And I understand, again, I’m not a movie buff properly, but I understand like in Oppenheimer, um, Nolan had different colored— he like used black and white and color for different kind of styles or parts of the movie. And I thought that’s what this needed. It needed me— I needed much more distinction in the character. Yes. Or the look. And when something about when we are—

[00:16:05] Stephen Fenech: well, you can tell. I know whether you remember when Hugh Jackman— remember he broke his leg, he hurt his when he fell through and he had a limp as a result of that. So you obviously know that those scenes where he’s limping happened after that.

[00:16:17] Trevor Long: I’ve only just realized that now.

[00:16:18] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Okay. Just another idea, another way of explaining when this was. Why he’s carrying a cane. ‘Cause he’s limping.

[00:16:24] Trevor Long: As a first-time viewer though, which I am. Oh yeah. It was confusing until it became irrelevant essentially midway through where you’re like, I just get it, it’s happening and now I am following the flow.

[00:16:34] Stephen Fenech: So the movie opens with John Cutter, that’s Michael Caine’s character, explaining the 3 parts of a magic trick in a voiceover. And did you notice there was like a little shot of a, like a paddock of identical— Yes, the hats.

[00:16:50] Trevor Long: And you know what, when I saw that shot, I thought, I bet you that’s important later on.

[00:16:54] Stephen Fenech: It is. Yeah, you were right. But here is Michael Caine explaining the 3 parts of a magic trick.

[00:17:01] Movie Audio: [Cutter’s opening voiceover explains the three acts of every magic trick: the pledge, where something ordinary is shown; the turn, where it is made to do something extraordinary; and the prestige, where what vanished is brought back.]

[00:18:31] Trevor Long: And I love in the first 5 minutes of the movie they’ve named them, they’ve said the name of the movie.

[00:18:35] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, love that. Now in the background of that, you probably heard the cuts in the audio. In the background of that with the Hugh Jackman, Robert Angier was performing the new Transported man. So this is The end of the movie at the beginning. Yeah, where he’s performing that, he steps into this buzzing electrical device, disappears through a trapdoor, but drops into a locked glass water tank beneath the stage. Yeah, and that’s where we see Alfred Borden, Christian Bale. Remember, he was— he told the guy, ‘Yes, I’m part of the act, you fool,’ and went down to the tank. And, uh, he’s— he witnesses Angier drowning, rushes under the stage. Angier dies behind the glass. Borden is caught at the scene and arrested for murder.

[00:19:20] Trevor Long: Interesting, importantly, now that we’ve seen the whole movie, it’s cut and shot in a way early on that you’re truly made to think he killed him. You’re made to think, what do you, why did you lock him in there? What is going on? Why have you locked this guy in there? Why have you done this? That’s what’s plant, the seed that’s planted for you there is this rivalry to the point of murder.

[00:19:41] Stephen Fenech: So we’re still in the present timeline in the prison. Borden is visited by Mr. Owens, an attorney representing the wealthy reclusive Lord Kaldlow, who wants to buy Borden’s secrets in exchange for taking financial care of his young daughter Jess.

[00:20:01] Movie Audio: [In prison, Owens tells Borden that Lord Caldlow wants to buy his tricks, including the Transported Man. Borden refuses to sell his greatest trick and says Fallon will take care of his daughter.]

[00:20:27] Trevor Long: Poor child.

[00:20:29] Movie Audio: [Owens warns that the courts will take the girl from Fallon and she will end up in the workhouse, offering her a secure future as Lord Caldlow’s ward. As a show of good faith, he hands Borden Robert Angier’s diary from his time in Colorado. Borden insists Angier never learned his trick and says Owens should dig Angier up and ask him.]

[00:21:29] Trevor Long: So you realize he’s for the death penalty? He’s going to be hung because that’s what he says. For the drop and that Angie— Talking about wrap up your affairs and you’re thinking you’ve got a little daughter, like wrap up your affairs, bro. This is actually the best thing for her.

[00:21:42] Stephen Fenech: But I think now having seen it and now examining it in the end, yeah. So much different. The chess pieces are being put in place already, you know? Yeah.

[00:21:50] Trevor Long: Yes. Now we all know how it ends. It’s like, you cunning devil.

[00:21:55] Stephen Fenech: Like, I was wondering what you’re gonna say there.

[00:21:57] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:21:59] Stephen Fenech: Anyway, uh, he gets the— Angier’s personal diary, and he’s reading it. Flash, flash to flashback to Colorado. Angier goes and visits— finds Tesla’s house and asks his assistant if he can see him.

[00:22:18] Movie Audio: [Angier arrives at Tesla’s fenced compound in Colorado. Tesla’s assistant Alley recognises him as the Great Danton from his London shows, but says a meeting with Tesla is impossible, even for a lot of money. Angier says he’ll be staying at the hotel, and Alley shows he has lifted Angier’s watch.]

[00:23:24] Trevor Long: Yeah, I’m saying indefinitely, which means I’m not leaving until you get me out of here.

[00:23:27] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s right. Yeah. And that was Andy Serkis, who played the Tesla’s assistant. He was in Lord of the Rings and plenty of other movies. He was in Star Wars last year.

[00:23:36] Trevor Long: You’re naming movies I wouldn’t want to watch or remember.

[00:23:40] Stephen Fenech: Now we go back now. Flashback to the first timeline. It’s years earlier. Borden and Angier are working as planted shills in the audience for Milton the Magician, who was managed by Cutter, you know, Michael Caine’s character.

[00:23:56] Trevor Long: This part of the movie makes me think, are the people they choose from the audience always real? Yeah, mostly.

[00:24:02] Stephen Fenech: I’ve been chosen from the audience in David Copperfield in Vegas, and I was a plant, but, and they told me what to, I had to do. And what I had to wear. So when I was in Vegas one time, a woman said, oh, would you like to help David? I said, yeah. And she said, okay, you need to wear this tie. So do up your shirt, wear this tie. And then when he calls you up on stage, take off the tie and give it to him. And then he made the tie dance around in a box. And then when he goes, when you finish, go back to your seat. When the lights go down, stand up, and then he’ll throw the tie back to you to maintain the illusion that it’s your tie. And then they gave me— at the intermission, the interval, the halfway interval, I had to give the tie back. And she gave me an envelope that says, if anyone asks you where the tie is, it’s in this envelope. And it was the— what I found out later was a napkin taped into the shape of a tie. So if someone felt it, it felt like a tie. And there was an autographed picture of David Copperfield in there too.

[00:25:03] Trevor Long: You’ve never told me that story before. No, man. That is crazy.

[00:25:07] Stephen Fenech: I’m pretty sure I have. No, really. I’ve still got the autographed picture. And the little MGM Grand napkin that’s taped into a tie. Yeah, yeah. So I was on the stage and had to sort of tap a box and imitate what he does, and they told me to the letter what I need to do. So I was a plant, but I didn’t do the trick though. I was just there to help.

[00:25:25] Trevor Long: But the tie was the plant.

[00:25:27] Stephen Fenech: The tie was the plant. There you go. That’s crazy. Hadn’t I told you that before?

[00:25:30] Trevor Long: Bro, you’ve told me a million times you’ve been to see David Copperfield. Yeah, no, mate, you’ve told me.

[00:25:34] Stephen Fenech: I went on stage another time holding holding the rope around when he makes the car appear, and it was like, oh, was a meter away from it, and I’m thinking, how do you do that? It was just there. Crazy.

[00:25:44] Trevor Long: Okay, back to the movie.

[00:25:46] Stephen Fenech: So Angier and Borden are helping Milton the magician. Yep.

[00:25:51] Trevor Long: And they’re like tying up the hot girl.

[00:25:52] Stephen Fenech: Angier’s wife, which is Piper Perabo, um, she’s, uh, she’s the assistant who’s bound in ropes and lowered into the water tank. You know, little, uh, Angier sneaks a little kiss So yeah, kisses her on the leg.

[00:26:04] Trevor Long: And this is also a critical moment where he’s tying the knot. Yes.

[00:26:09] Stephen Fenech: So Borden has to tie the knot a certain way and he stumbles on it.

[00:26:13] Trevor Long: And old mate Michael Caine’s across the stage looking and sees him stumble. He’s like, come on, come on, mate, you gotta get this right.

[00:26:21] Stephen Fenech: So he, after he tells Anjie to go watch, so that they, they, she’s lowered the tank, she gets out, and after the performance Cutter tells Angie and Borden to go watch Chung Ling Soo perform, and he said, I’ll challenge you to try work out how he does his tricks. Yeah, this is an old trick. This really old Asian guy, he’s got a—

[00:26:42] Trevor Long: he makes things appear under a cloth, and he makes this fishbowl with water and fish in it appear.

[00:26:48] Stephen Fenech: Yep.

[00:26:48] Trevor Long: And you’re looking at it and you’re going, this is unbelievable. Like, even in the movie, I’m going, that’s unbelievable. Yeah. But I love the bit where he’s trying to work out how to do it. Hugh Jackman’s, you know, at the head of the bed trying to, you know, mimic this whole thing. So there was watching this guy.

[00:27:01] Stephen Fenech: His age, as you said, his old guy appears frail, uh, even off stage. Yep. But makes a heavy fishbowl materialize between his legs.

[00:27:09] Trevor Long: So good.

[00:27:10] Stephen Fenech: Borden realizes though that the man’s entire life is a disguise to sustain the illusion.

[00:27:22] Movie Audio: [Borden points out that Chung Ling Soo’s frailty is the performance itself, a total devotion to his art that keeps anyone from detecting his method. Later, Angier struggles to lift the empty fishbowl and marvels at living a whole life as someone else. Julia notes he’s already pretending, having changed his name to spare his family, and suggests a stage name for him: the Great Danton.]

[00:28:33] Stephen Fenech: Great Dan Tong.

[00:28:34] Trevor Long: My little English lessons quickly. Now let me just say here quickly, like now that I’m listening to it back and if I was watching it back, you’re like, the whole thing’s hidden in plain sight.

[00:28:42] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:28:42] Trevor Long: Like the lifelong deception is— yeah, they’re talking about this, this—

[00:28:47] Stephen Fenech: yes, well, this guy, this guy is—

[00:28:48] Trevor Long: well, lifelong deception. It’s really—

[00:28:50] Stephen Fenech: let me tell you, my interjections are going to be called a presto pop. Okay, my presto pop is that Chung Ling Soo, this character was inspired by a real person.

[00:29:02] Trevor Long: Really?

[00:29:03] Stephen Fenech: The person, the magician, American performer William Ellsworth Robinson created this persona of a Chinese illusionist through his— wait, was he not Asian? No, throughout his public and private life. Yeah, to exploit the audience interest in East Asian performance styles. Wow. But also because they thought he was, uh, Chinese and frail, they thought he can— any achievement, it would just make it seem even better.

[00:29:32] Trevor Long: Makes sense. Yeah. Wow.

[00:29:34] Stephen Fenech: Uh, Borden at this point meets Sarah, you know, Rebecca Hall, falls in love, and they eventually get married. Now next, like, and he’s a down-on-his-luck magician here.

[00:29:43] Trevor Long: He’s not contributing anything to this relationship. She loves him for who he is, and she’s the breadwinner at this point and supportive. Like, you’ve got to see that, that arc of her. Just, it’s very small character.

[00:29:53] Stephen Fenech: It is, yeah, but very important. She, she plays a bigger part a bit later. Uh, now during another live performance, they’re back at it. Borden ties Julia’s wrists, but she fails to untie herself underwater. Angier and Cutter desperately shatter the glass with an axe, but Julia drowns.

[00:30:12] Trevor Long: I’ve got an interjection. Yeah, I’ve got a plot hole. Yeah, I don’t know if you’re gonna bring it up later, but no one did CPR. Like, bro, she drowned seconds ago. Yeah, trust me, she’s— I could save her.

[00:30:23] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I guess so. This was in the late 1800s. Pump the chest, brother! Did they know that back then? I don’t know.

[00:30:30] Trevor Long: Oh my God, maybe they didn’t. What is this, late ’80s?

[00:30:33] Stephen Fenech: ’89.

[00:30:34] Trevor Long: Yeah. Oh, okay.

[00:30:35] Stephen Fenech: At the funeral, Borden Gordon cannot tell a devastated Angie whether he tied the simple knot or the double slip.

[00:30:44] Movie Audio: [At Julia’s funeral, Angier demands to know which knot Borden tied. Borden says he keeps asking himself the same question and apologises that he simply doesn’t know.]

[00:31:12] Trevor Long: You don’t know? So yeah, I’ve fact-checked. CPR has been around since the 1700s, but in the medical community, it’s really only the ’60s and ’70s, 1960, ’70, that it became a thing. You know, I, uh, so I’ll let Hugh Jackman off here.

[00:31:26] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I thought the same. They would have tried something. Something. Yeah. Yeah, anyway, at this point, Borden and Angie go their separate ways. Of course, they’re establishing their own career paths. Now, Borden starts a modest solo act called The Professor alongside a silent stagehand named Fallon.

[00:31:43] Trevor Long: Good old Fallon, very quiet, unassuming chap.

[00:31:46] Stephen Fenech: Now, Sarah, his now wife, announces that she’s pregnant. Yeah, now then, another presto poppy for you. Yep, the infant the, the child they have was played by the, by Christopher Nolan’s, one of Christopher Nolan’s children. Oh wow, there was a baby. He’s my kid. Borden also explains his bullet catch trick. Yeah, which, and tells Sarah the secret.

[00:32:13] Trevor Long: And again, which he doesn’t normally do, he’s not big on telling her the secret or anything, but it’s, it’s important setup. Yes, for what happens. What’s about to happen. Yes, correct. Because you need to, you need to know how some of these tricks happen so that you understand the content of—

[00:32:28] Stephen Fenech: So the secret was that when he puts the bullet in with the wadding and he puts the long, what do you call that thing to pack it all in? Prodder? I don’t know. And then what happens when he takes that out, the bullet is inside it. Yes. It’s taken, so there’s no bullet in the gun. That’s right. And then he has it in his hand, which appears that it’s caught it, right? Um, so Borden is in a show.

[00:32:50] Trevor Long: It’s like a pub performance, you know what I mean? Like, it’s not like a big theater show.

[00:32:54] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. And he’s about to put on a dangerous trick, the bullet catch. Angier attends in disguise. Volunteers from the audience loads a live round and demands to know.

[00:33:04] Trevor Long: And here’s the thing, I’ll say to you this, I knew what was happening not just because he was disguised, but you could hear, if you listen to the soundtrack, you can hear the bullet fall into the— yeah, like roll down the barrel.

[00:33:14] Stephen Fenech: Because remember earlier they were saying all someone would have to do is put a penny in it or something, and then it’s got a projector all in it.

[00:33:19] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:33:21] Movie Audio: [At the bullet catch, the disguised Angier challenges Borden and demands to know which knot he tied before the gun fires. Borden’s narration says he has fought with himself over that night, one half sure he tied a simple slip knot, the other convinced it was the Langford double, and he could never know for sure. Angier, reading, can’t accept that Borden doesn’t know.]

[00:34:20] Stephen Fenech: So Borden loses two fingers on his left hand. Did you notice that? Cutter meets up with Angier again and tells him he wants to keep working. Angier adopts the stage name The Great Danton, which is what his late wife, uh, gave him, partnering with Cutter and hiring a glamorous assistant Olivia Wenscombe, which is played by Scarlett Johansson. Cutter creates—

[00:34:43] Trevor Long: who I picked. Yes, see, she— I know.

[00:34:45] Stephen Fenech: Yes, of course you know.

[00:34:46] Trevor Long: Oh, she’s married to her. Yeah, that’s it.

[00:34:51] Stephen Fenech: Cutter creates an imagined birdcage trick for Angier.

[00:34:54] Trevor Long: Yep.

[00:34:55] Stephen Fenech: And here we go again. Uh, Borden, in— during a performance, sabotages the vanishing birdcage trick by snapping the— because this is an elaborate—

[00:35:05] Trevor Long: you see now here, he’s like, engineer, is that what he’s called? You know, he’s the master of the creating of the trick. You know, it’s the uniform, it’s the gear, it’s the lever on the back. It’s this amazing thing. But old mate just completely ruins the trick, which means you can’t ever do it again because it’s ruined. People will think it’s violent and horrible.

[00:35:22] Stephen Fenech: And he not only kills the duck, but he injures the spectator’s hand, kills the show too, and ruins Angier’s venue contract because the venue owner said, don’t you kill that bird, you’re out. Now fast forward to Colorado Springs. You go on, go back to— no, no, we’re going forward. Forward. Angier travels to Colorado Springs to meet the inventor Nikola Tesla, which I can’t believe you didn’t realize that was David Bowie. No idea. And his assistant Ali. Angier believes that Tesla built Borden’s teleportation machine.

[00:35:56] Movie Audio: [Angier asks Tesla to build him something impossible. Tesla reflects on how society punished him for trying to change the world, says nothing is impossible, only expensive, and asks whether Angier has considered the true cost of such a machine. He urges Angier to go home and forget it, recognising an obsession that will bring no good. Angier replies that if Tesla understands obsession, he knows he won’t change his mind.]

[00:37:21] Stephen Fenech: True that.

[00:37:22] Trevor Long: Yeah, I love that, the line where Tesla’s like, the cost, and he’s thinking the money cost. No, no, he’s talking about the overall cost of what he’s trying to create.

[00:37:31] Stephen Fenech: The other question I had at this point was, where did he get his money from? Well, had he had such a successful career up until this point that he banked a lot of money?

[00:37:41] Trevor Long: Yeah, so this is my problem with the timeline generally is I’m not, you do need to stretch it out and understand fully the start to finish chronological timeline because There isn’t. I don’t think he—

[00:37:52] Stephen Fenech: like, yeah, because, because remember when he first met Andy Serkis, remember he said he got electrocuted, he got shocked on the door. Yeah. And he said, I saw your shows in London. And so he’s obviously—

[00:38:02] Trevor Long: maybe there’s a period of time where he just does very well and does okay, built up some wealth, and then he wants to get the ultimate trick now, I guess.

[00:38:09] Stephen Fenech: Back to Borden, and he debuts his Transported Man trick. He bounces a ball across the stage, enters a wardrobe, instantly from an identical wardrobe on the other side, he emerges to catch the ball.

[00:38:23] Trevor Long: Awesome tricks. So well done. Yeah. Yeah. And what you instantly do as an audience member is you go, could he have run that far and that fast? Like, it’s all in your mind. You’re just like, wow. Yeah. So good.

[00:38:33] Stephen Fenech: Angier and Cutter watch in disbelief. Cutter insists Borden must be using a double, but Angier is obsessed with how seamless and instantaneous it is.

[00:38:44] Movie Audio: [Angier calls the Transported Man the greatest trick he’s ever seen. Cutter says Borden is a wonderful magician but a dreadful showman who doesn’t know how to sell it, and insists he uses a double. Angier is adamant it’s the same man coming out of the second cabinet, pointing to the padded gloves that hide Borden’s damaged fingers. He vows to steal the trick from the man who stole his life, and Cutter says they’ll need to find someone who looks like him.]

[00:39:44] Trevor Long: See, it’s that blinded by revenge. So you— I think that’s, that’s the thing. You can look at this and go, well, why didn’t he see this, or why didn’t he see that in retrospect? But you’ve also got to remember, he thinks this bloke killed his wife. Blinded by—

[00:39:57] Stephen Fenech: how could he not know?

[00:39:57] Trevor Long: Yeah, that’s right.

[00:39:59] Stephen Fenech: So they do find Angie a double. Gerald Root, also played by Hugh Jackman, as you noticed. Yeah, an out-of-work drunk. Well shot.

[00:40:07] Trevor Long: Really, I love a movie where the same person— yeah, but just the way they can cut between cameras, you know, and it’s just well shot.

[00:40:14] Stephen Fenech: Angier successfully performs the illusion to sold-out crowds, but Angier is tormented because he’s thinking, I’m hiding under the stage while Root takes the applause and all the glory.

[00:40:25] Trevor Long: He’s not getting the glory.

[00:40:26] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, he’s not enjoying the prestige. Angier sends Olivia to work as Borden’s assistant and to spy on him.

[00:40:36] Movie Audio: [Olivia arrives at Borden’s workshop. Borden accuses her of coming to steal the rest of his show; she says she’s there to give it what it’s missing. She admits Angier sent her to steal his secret, but says Angier takes no pleasure in their success, is consumed by Borden’s methods, and that she has come to offer Borden Angier’s secrets instead.]

[00:41:57] Stephen Fenech: She’s got a really good British accent. She does a good job there. And that’s Christian Bale’s real accent. Yes, he’s, he’s, he’s from Wales. He’s, he’s, he’s really British. Yeah. Um, Borden discovers Root. Remember, he meets him in the bar and sort of schemes with him. That’s Angier’s double. And at one point, remember, he removes the mattress under Angier’s trapdoor, so he falls. That’s when he breaks his leg, right? His leg. Yeah, it’s Borden then appears on stage, ties Root up— remember, he’s hanging from the ceiling— he tied him up with a rope and advertised his own upcoming shows. Uh, some of the best marketing I’ve ever seen. Just massive humiliation for Ongier though. Uh, Ongier confronts Olivia afterwards, and she at that point gives him his encrypted notebook.

[00:42:46] Movie Audio: [Angier, now limping, confronts Olivia, accusing her of improving Borden’s act and falling for him. Olivia says Cutter was right that Borden uses a double, having seen disguises hidden backstage; Angier dismisses it as deliberate misdirection. She produces Borden’s notebook, which she has borrowed for the night, but Angier says it’s written in cipher and could take months to decode without the keyword. Olivia warns it won’t bring his wife back; Angier says he no longer cares about his wife, only Borden’s secret.]

[00:44:18] Stephen Fenech: So what he does to cover it up, he stages a break-in at Borden’s workshop, and so he’ll think the notebook was stolen.

[00:44:24] Trevor Long: He’s not going to blame her because it’s all good.

[00:44:26] Stephen Fenech: But get this, it takes a bit of a turn here. Angier kidnaps Fallon, you know, he’s off, uh, Borden’s offsider. Buries him in a coffin and forces Borden out to give up the cipher keyword to save his life. Borden writes down the word, which we later know is Tesla. Now, going back to Colorado Springs, Angier has traveled to Colorado to meet the inventor Tesla and the assistant Circus, right? So there’s another, another meeting. Tesla— while Tesla experiments Angie Deciphers Borden’s Diary.

[00:45:05] Movie Audio: [Borden’s diary, as Angier deciphers it, describes his love for Olivia and his need for proof of her fidelity, then turns to address Angier directly: Olivia gave Angier the notebook at Borden’s request, “Tesla” is only the key to the diary, not to the trick, and Borden bids him goodbye and wishes him solace in America.]

[00:46:28] Stephen Fenech: Mate, so the final entry shows that Borden anticipated that he was going to steal it.

[00:46:32] Trevor Long: Yep.

[00:46:33] Stephen Fenech: Well, he was given it, and the journal was just a wild goose chase.

[00:46:36] Trevor Long: It was a plant, the whole thing.

[00:46:38] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Meanwhile, uh, despite Borden’s little trick there, Tesla actually builds a functional machine for Angier During testing, they discovered the machine does not transport an object, it duplicates it.

[00:46:52] Trevor Long: Yeah, because he’s done it, it doesn’t work. Apparently doesn’t— it doesn’t work. So he goes back, and then I think when Angie is leaving, he’s like, hang on a minute, there’s a cat and 100 hats.

[00:47:00] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, so a black cat’s duplicated, and a clearing of identical top hats also revealed. Now here’s a point. Now remember when he was in the hotel and he says, oh, Thomas Edison’s people are here, um, and there was some rivalry there. Yeah, Tesla’s forced to destroy his lab and flee Colorado. Meanwhile, Tesla has shipped the complete— completed machine to Ongya with a parting warning.

[00:47:29] Movie Audio: [Tesla’s farewell letter apologises for leaving Colorado without saying goodbye, notes that the truly extraordinary isn’t permitted in science, and says Angier will find what he’s looking for in the box, with Alley’s instructions. His one suggestion: destroy the machine and sink it in the deepest ocean, because it will bring him only misery.]

[00:48:09] Trevor Long: So he knows what he’s created.

[00:48:12] Stephen Fenech: Absolutely. Now here’s another scene. Sarah and Borden, they’re having a bit of an argument. Sarah has her suspicions about him and Olivia, right? And she asks him if he loves her, and his reply is, ‘Not today.’ And Sarah later goes to the workshop and hangs herself.

[00:48:29] Trevor Long: Yes. And by the way, At this point of the movie, we’re 40-odd minutes left. Yes.

[00:48:35] Stephen Fenech: Do you remember what I texted you? Yes, I did.

[00:48:37] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:48:37] Stephen Fenech: Do you want to read it out?

[00:48:38] Trevor Long: Yeah, go for it. Yeah.

[00:48:39] Stephen Fenech: I’ll read out what you said. Let me just unlock my phone here.

[00:48:43] Trevor Long: ‘Cause you know, I like to think I can see movies coming, but rarely can you.

[00:48:48] Stephen Fenech: Yep. You said, you sent me your proof of life photo as usual. And you said, 41 minutes to go. I think I know the secret.

[00:48:59] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:49:00] Stephen Fenech: And so you were thinking that you knew that there was not one but two.

[00:49:04] Trevor Long: It was the, it was the misdirect of the diary and the fact that he was like scripting what was coming that made me go, he’s a twin.

[00:49:13] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:49:14] Trevor Long: Like at that point I went, he’s a twin. And it’s funny because again, you’re told it earlier. He’s like, it’s a double. Like, and you don’t think about how easy a double can be for some people.

[00:49:23] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:49:23] Trevor Long: But there you go. Yeah. So it was, it was, and now, but it didn’t take away from the movie at all because I’m now ensconced in Well, Fallon, who you see, he’s always got a hat on, beard, glasses. Yeah, you could tell what was going on there.

[00:49:36] Stephen Fenech: You can see some resemblance there.

[00:49:37] Trevor Long: And he’s also got his head down and stuff like that. So that all makes sense. But then there’s a whole other part to this, which is the second trick, which is Angier.

[00:49:46] Stephen Fenech: But I’ve got another presto pop here. Rebecca Hall, remember in that scene when they’re talking, she says, “I know what you are.” Yes, she says to him.

[00:49:54] Trevor Long: That’s it, yeah.

[00:49:55] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that was improvised line, right? And she thought, ooh, maybe she was a bit worried thinking that the unscripted line could give away the twist.

[00:50:06] Trevor Long: Right. Well, yeah, it helped.

[00:50:08] Stephen Fenech: Well, Christopher Nolan said he retained the take after determining the ambiguity of the statement. It sort of maintained the integrity of the secret.

[00:50:18] Trevor Long: Yeah, it’s part of the illusion. Yeah, that’s it. Yeah.

[00:50:22] Stephen Fenech: Now, uh, Angier returns to London with the massive electrical machine and with Cutter. He mounts a limited 100-performance run of the real Transported Man.

[00:50:35] Movie Audio: [Angier opens his new show by telling the audience that what they’re about to see is not magic but pure science, and invites volunteers on stage to examine the machine.]

[00:51:29] Movie Audio: [Borden rages over Angier’s success, questioning why the run is limited to 100 performances and how Angier crosses fifty yards in a second, frustrated that he can’t outthink him.]

[00:51:52] Stephen Fenech: I think he’s sort of fallen at that point.

[00:51:54] Trevor Long: Yeah, he’s freaking— like, he’s freaking out. It’s the opposite, right? So earlier Hugh Jackman’s character is annoyed because he can’t work out his, and now his is seemingly better and he can’t work it out.

[00:52:07] Stephen Fenech: So every night he activates the machine, Angier vanishes in a flash of lightning and instantly appears in the back of the auditorium to thunderous applause. Yep. Did you get this bit where he hired blind stagehands? Yes. Which move the heavy—

[00:52:21] Trevor Long: the Michael Caine character thinks he’s genius because it’s like protecting the secret. Yeah, it’s protecting the prestige. Yeah, he thinks it’s genius. Like, that’s why let anyone share your secret?

[00:52:31] Stephen Fenech: He hires them to move a heavy locked water tank out of the cellar each night to store in an abandoned warehouse.

[00:52:39] Trevor Long: Which again, on reflection, which we’ll see, should be the absolute hint that there’s something weird going on. Why would you need to move it Exactly right. Like, why does that ever need to leave? If it’s 100 nights, we’ll find— just leave it there, right? So it’s funny how much of this is hidden in plain sight.

[00:52:52] Stephen Fenech: So now we’re at the point of the movie where we’re approaching the start. Remember what we saw at the start of the movie? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where Borden attends the final performance to figure out the secret. Remember, he slips backstage and he goes, I’m part of the performance, you idiot. Yeah, yeah. And he goes back, which, by the way, is how you can get backstage anywhere.

[00:53:07] Trevor Long: You just— with confidence. Yeah, like, honestly.

[00:53:09] Stephen Fenech: Uh, he finds a Lockwater the tank beneath the stage just as Angie drops in.

[00:53:13] Trevor Long: He witnesses him drop through and, and like, he’s like, oh, this is fine. And then he realizes it’s locked and he can’t get out. Yeah. And see, this is the bit that’s all clipped out of that, what I mentioned at the start. It’s clipped differently, so at the start you think he’s the murderer, but now you realize he was just there. He was just there and he tries to save him.

[00:53:30] Stephen Fenech: He does. Yeah, he tries to smash the glass, but he can’t. Cutter arrives, assumes Borden sabotaged the trick, and hands him over to the police. Angia is pronounced dead. Borden is tried and sentenced to be hung. Yeah, uh, I’ve got something to talk about later on when we discover something. Okay, I want to, uh, I’ll revisit that. But back to the present timeline now. In prison, Borden transfers the guardianship of Jess, his daughter, to Lord Coldlow’s representative to keep her out of the work— the workhouse. She would have had to go. Yeah, she’d be like a child slave.

[00:54:06] Trevor Long: Yep.

[00:54:07] Stephen Fenech: Lord Cordlow visits Borden in his cell. Cordlow steps into the light, revealing himself to be Robert Angier, alive and well.

[00:54:17] Movie Audio: [In Borden’s cell, Angier taunts him about his chains. Borden protests that he tried to pull Angier out of the tank. Angier says he only wanted to prove he was the better magician, and that he wins because no one cares about the man who disappears. Borden insists it’s no longer a competition but his daughter’s life. Angier takes Jess away and tears up the secret Borden offers him, declaring that whatever Borden’s secret was, his own is better, as Borden promises Jess he’ll bring her home.]

[00:55:49] Stephen Fenech: After this, I could have kept going with the audio there, but he screams in, he goes, “You, aren’t you?

[00:55:52] Trevor Long: You can save me.” He’s talking to the prison guards going, “That’s the guy I meant to have killed.” He’s alive. But what’s really interesting about that is it’s that, it’s the victory for Angie, which is, I don’t need your secrets anymore.

[00:56:05] Stephen Fenech: Don’t need it. Mine are better.

[00:56:06] Trevor Long: Yeah. Just rip it up.

[00:56:07] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. In front of him.

[00:56:09] Trevor Long: Stupid idea in retrospect, ’cause if he did open it up, he would’ve—

[00:56:13] Stephen Fenech: Might’ve helped him. Exactly right. Angie takes Jess away, leaves Borden with no recourse. Cutter. Remember, they were talking about delivering the machine to Lord Caldwell, and he realizes it’s Angier who is still alive. Hello, Cutter.

[00:56:29] Movie Audio: [Cutter is stunned to find Angier alive after seeing him on a slab, recognises Jess from court, and accuses Angier of letting Borden hang with his help. He says he came to beg Lord Caldlow to let him destroy the machine; Angier says it will never be used again and asks Cutter to deliver it to his theatre with the prestige materials.]

[00:57:22] Stephen Fenech: So meanwhile, Borden, led to the gallows. Yep. Asked for his final words, he whispers abracadabra, and then the trapdoor opens and he hangs.

[00:57:30] Trevor Long: Solid final words, by the way. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:57:32] Stephen Fenech: Now Angier is in his abandoned warehouse to pack up Tesla’s machine a shadowy figure appears, shoots Angie in the chest. It is Alfred Borden. Now the dying Angie realizes the truth. Alfred Borden was not one man, but identical twins.

[00:57:53] Movie Audio: [The dying Angier realises Borden was Fallon all along. Borden explains they were both Fallon and both Borden, taking turns, swapping in the trick. He says it was simple but never easy for two men to share one life: he loved Sarah, his brother loved Olivia, and each had half a life. Sacrifice, he tells Angier, is the price of a good trick.]

[00:59:15] Trevor Long: So good, because again, the little hints throughout where his wife wife is like, do you love me? And he goes, I can tell. She says, I can tell, I can tell the days that you do and the days you don’t. Like, she can, she can see when he’s lying. And she was seeing the twin. She didn’t know.

[00:59:30] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. And so that gets wild. So one loves Sarah, the other loved Olivia. And how’s, how’s it work out? So the one who was hanged loved Olivia, who’s still alive. Yeah. And the one who’s still alive loves Sarah, who she committed suicide. Yeah, they took turns playing Borden and the disguised stagehand Fallon. And when— remember when he lost his fingers? What about this? They had to get— okay, mate, you got to lose yours too.

[00:59:54] Trevor Long: Which again explains why he had that injury, that it’s like she’s like, why is it bleeding? Why is it healing?

[00:59:58] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, why is it not healing? Yeah, right. Yeah, so he had to be matched. So that’s his dedication to his craft.

[01:00:04] Trevor Long: Yes, to the prestige, to the trick.

[01:00:06] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, the brother who loved Olivia and attended the final show was the one hanged, and the surviving brother is the one who loves Sarah and Jess. Um, my presto pop here too is hinted in at this in the movie and confirmed in the novel. The twins are named Albert and Frederick, which when you combine the names is Alfred. Albert Frederick Alfred. Yeah, the hint in the movie is when Olivia refers to Borden, she insists on calling him Freddy, which, um, Sarah Borden’s wife says, oh no, don’t call me that. Yeah, remember, he said she doesn’t like being— yeah, that’s true. Yes, that is. This could mean that so many little hints. Frederick Borden was the one in love with Olivia, and Albert Borden was the one in love with Sarah and was also the father of Jess.

[01:00:53] Trevor Long: There you go.

[01:00:55] Stephen Fenech: All right, Angier reveals his own grim secret. Every night he stepped into Tesla’s machine, it created a living duplicate. Remember, he had his gun. Remember, he shot one of them as well. And, um, Angier never knew that if he would be the man who stepped onto the Prestige balcony or the man who dropped into the the tank, to drown in the tank. So Borden leaves Angier to die. Fire starts up in the warehouse. Borden reunites with his daughter in Cutter’s workshop.

[01:01:23] Trevor Long: Yes.

[01:01:24] Stephen Fenech: And the final shot pans through the burning warehouse past rows of sealed water tanks, revealing the preferred— preserved drowned corpses of Angier’s nightly duplicates.

[01:01:38] Movie Audio: [Cutter’s closing voiceover returns to the three acts of a magic trick, ending on the idea that audiences aren’t really looking for the secret, because they want to be fooled.]

[01:02:36] Stephen Fenech: You want to be fooled.

[01:02:37] Trevor Long: Yeah, it’s a crazy ending because it’s like Cutter teams up with the other guy. Do you know what I mean?

[01:02:44] Stephen Fenech: Like he had a sort of foot in both camps really, didn’t he?

[01:02:47] Trevor Long: Yeah, but it was always Angier’s way. Do you know what I mean? It felt like it was always more him supporting his career. Maybe. Yeah, I feel like that was a twist. That was the weirdest little twist you couldn’t see coming. Coming.

[01:03:00] Stephen Fenech: This is one line, uh, I normally have more lines, but I wanted to put more in the show. Uh, here’s one line. Remember when he’s preparing the dove trick?

[01:03:09] Movie Audio: [Angier tells Cutter the birdcage can’t be their climax and he doesn’t want to kill doves. Cutter tells him he’s a magician, not a wizard, and has to get his hands dirty to achieve the impossible.]

[01:03:22] Trevor Long: Get your head— that’s a common theme. And get the use of the term wizard is also used a couple of times in the essentially by magicians to describe actual magic. Do you know what I mean? Like, it’s a way Cutter describes people who frankly, they can’t understand what they’re doing and it is, it’s pure magic.

[01:03:38] Stephen Fenech: Now, how did that happen here? Let’s get into a couple of plot holes. I’ve got a lot to unpack here. You got one there?

[01:03:43] Trevor Long: Well, my biggest challenge is, how does the duplicate, does the duplicate, from the machine always retain the knowledge of Angier because it’s the original that dies every night. The original drops into the tank and dies every night, right? So it’s the duplicate that is created on the balcony, right? There it is on the balcony.

[01:04:07] Stephen Fenech: And then, yeah.

[01:04:08] Trevor Long: So every night it’s the duplicate. So the original guy died 100 tricks ago.

[01:04:14] Stephen Fenech: 100 times, yeah, yeah.

[01:04:15] Trevor Long: He died 100 tricks ago and it’s been a duplicate ever since. So I’m like, are we meant to think that it’s not a duplicate? Or yeah.

[01:04:24] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. I don’t know which one’s aware and are they both aware? Like, yeah, it’s a mind bender for sure.

[01:04:30] Trevor Long: But yeah, because after the first or second time, it’s like, yeah, why would you walk into that knowing you’re about to die?

[01:04:35] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. But then the duplicate arrives and then— Yes, but you’re the duplicate.

[01:04:39] Trevor Long: I’m like, I’m not going to walk in there. I’m about to die.

[01:04:41] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[01:04:43] Trevor Long: In the tank underneath the stage.

[01:04:44] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, there’s no— I can’t explain it.

[01:04:48] Trevor Long: Only the only explanation in my mind is it’s for the art. Same reason the guy pretends to have a limp and carries a fishbowl around with him.

[01:04:57] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s the theme of it. It’s the same reason. Whole life. Oh mate, chopped his fingers off just on that, right? So here’s my plot hole. Sarah, remember when he explains the bullet cat trick to her? Yeah. So he says, okay, I can trust you. He marries his wife, right? Right? So why didn’t he trust her with all these other secrets? Why didn’t he establish at the start, you know what, I’m a twin, okay, that’s my thing, he’s always in disguise, we’ll take turns, this is me, you’ll know who I am?

[01:05:24] Trevor Long: I don’t want to break it to you, I think, um, most women would not be happy with their husband exposing themselves as a twin and a double life that might result in her not knowing who the hell’s who.

[01:05:36] Stephen Fenech: If he told her the secret, or if he explained it as the secret of the Transported Man man, it could have saved her life. She would have known because that’s what— remember, that’s what separated them, is thinking, well, he— she thought that the person that she was talking to at one point wasn’t the guy who was in love with her, right? And that’s what drove her to suicide. So him— her knowing—

[01:05:57] Trevor Long: you sure it was suicide?

[01:05:59] Stephen Fenech: What do you mean? She hung herself.

[01:06:00] Trevor Long: She knew who he was.

[01:06:03] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, so what you reckon?

[01:06:05] Trevor Long: What did she know? Between— was she going to expose the secret? Did he kill her?

[01:06:10] Stephen Fenech: She was heartbroken and killed herself. Yeah, yeah. Uh, another thing too, like, how do you not know what knot you tied? How do you not know? She couldn’t— obviously, obviously that he knew the knot she tied because she couldn’t untie herself. It was the one that he shouldn’t have done. Yeah, that was the knot he tied.

[01:06:30] Trevor Long: Well, no, no, hang on. The reason could be because he was continually asking the wrong one, the wrong twin. Yeah, the other twin. If you ask ask Twin A what knot he tied, but it was Twin B that tied the knot. He doesn’t— Twin A doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. Yeah, you know what I mean?

[01:06:44] Stephen Fenech: Maybe, maybe. Um, we also— here’s another— this is a big plot hole. He’s sent to jail receiving the death penalty for murder. So is it— did he have not a decent lawyer to say, listen, mate, I didn’t do it, I was just standing there? Now he drives during a trick, Borden was an observer. So the, the, the Borden didn’t put the tank there. And the other thing Borden couldn’t have been accused of is he made no attempt to rescue him, but he did.

[01:07:14] Trevor Long: Well, the allegation is that he changed the lock to be one that wasn’t unpickable by— yeah, you know what I mean? So that’s why he’s convicted.

[01:07:22] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I’ve got one little book v film difference here. In the, in the book, the machine works a little bit different. It doesn’t copy a person exactly as they are, memories and personality intact, as it seems in the movie. Um, instead, it in fact transports the essence of the person into a newly created body, leaving behind a similar seemingly dead husks. And the dead husks are what Angier refers to as his prestige materials in the novel. You get that?

[01:07:54] Trevor Long: I do, but it makes me even— it makes it even more hard to believe. Yeah, the trick, because if he dies every night after disappearing from walking into the thing.

[01:08:02] Stephen Fenech: He kills for his art, mate.

[01:08:03] Trevor Long: Yeah, but if in the book they don’t have the knowledge, they’re just husks.

[01:08:07] Stephen Fenech: They’re just husks.

[01:08:08] Trevor Long: What do they know? How do they know to present themselves as, “Ta-da!” up on the balcony?

[01:08:12] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s all part of the magic, mate. All part of the trick.

[01:08:15] Trevor Long: I’m hating it more and more the more I think about it.

[01:08:16] Stephen Fenech: He’s creating duplicates with the machine. I think that you’ve got to have a little bit of, you’ve got a bit of license to how that works. That’s fair.

[01:08:24] Trevor Long: Yeah, that’s fair.

[01:08:25] Stephen Fenech: The speaker workout. This is a— I had to turn this movie down a lot. This was, uh, especially during the parts where they’re using the electric— the electricity in the machine, mate, that was rocking my house, my theater. That was big. The performances were awesome. The Tesla experiences— experiments were also pretty good. Music was good. Did you notice much of the music?

[01:08:44] Trevor Long: No, no, I didn’t mind at all.

[01:08:46] Stephen Fenech: Um, thank God I got a big screen. It was actually nominated for cinematography. It was beautiful, very nicely shot. All of his movies are nice.

[01:08:54] Trevor Long: It was dark enough to believe it was ye olde times. You know, I feel like, ’cause the lack of power, the lack of electricity, the lack of all that made it work. Yeah, so I quite liked that.

[01:09:07] Stephen Fenech: Okay, the business. I’m gonna tell you the code of ethics among magicians.

[01:09:12] Trevor Long: All right, okay.

[01:09:13] Stephen Fenech: There are two organizations, the International Brotherhood of Magicians and the Society of American Magicians. And here are their ethical codes. Oppose exposure. Prevent the willful public exposure of magic methods or principles. Avoid interfering with or jeopardizing another magician’s performance, and do not use another’s creation without authorization. Recognize and honor the rights of inventors, authors, and creators of magic concepts and apparatus. Discourage false or misleading claims in marketing magic effects or literature. Promote humane treatment and proper care for any animals used in the acts.

[01:09:52] Trevor Long: So the bird tricks aren’t as described. Probably not.

[01:09:55] Stephen Fenech: Ensure physical and virtual safety for audiences, avoid methods to intentionally humiliate spectators, and follow all local and national laws regarding vulnerable participants.

[01:10:06] Trevor Long: Nice. Yeah, it is a remarkable thing that, that it is kept secret, do you know what I mean? Like, it is— yeah, it is remarkable if it gets out, but especially in this day and age with so much clickbait and my algorithm.

[01:10:22] Stephen Fenech: I’m a big magic fan and my algorithm has tricks explained. Oh, real card tricks? Heaps of mine.

[01:10:30] Trevor Long: I like that.

[01:10:30] Stephen Fenech: Okay, uh, every day is a school day. What’s our lesson or theme here? I reckon the one that stands out to me is the dedication to one’s art.

[01:10:40] Trevor Long: Oh no, no question. He makes—

[01:10:42] Stephen Fenech: he’s so dedicated that his life revolves around that dedication.

[01:10:47] Trevor Long: All three, like the Asian dude, the Carl— Four Cutter, everyone, they’re all dedicated.

[01:10:51] Stephen Fenech: At least the next one, which is obsession. Obsession and rivalry. Their rivalry is so intense that they’ve created this obsession.

[01:10:58] Trevor Long: Could also be seen as revenge too, from Angier’s point of view.

[01:11:02] Stephen Fenech: And what about, um, the dual identities? Like both— look, at the end Angier had duplicates, um, Borden was a twin. So that’s sort of the fractured identity, sort of. Yeah, yeah. Uh, best use of the pause button. If you pause the credits you will see the producers wish to thank David Copperfield. Really? He was obviously consultant, right? So yeah, that’s cool. My mate Dave. Your mate Dave. Uh, things you might not know, uh, the edit— the film has 146 time jump cuts. Wow. And, uh, it’s— so the next shot either flashes back or skips ahead to another time period. The average is almost one timeline jump per minute of movie.

[01:11:47] Trevor Long: That’s crazy.

[01:11:48] Stephen Fenech: So looking back on it, it is pretty solid. Uh, Ricky Jay conducted intensive sleight of hand workshops for Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale. Now Ricky Jay was the actor who was on— he was Milton the Magician at the start. He’s an actor and a magician. He’s been in other movies, that guy. You’ll notice him. And so he, uh, was able to give him— show him the ropes, so to speak. And so that way they could appear, uh, authentic to the period. Yeah. So no need to use digital post-production manipulation.

[01:12:21] Trevor Long: Makes sense.

[01:12:22] Stephen Fenech: Uh, David Bowie.

[01:12:24] Trevor Long: Yes.

[01:12:25] Stephen Fenech: First, his first, uh, instinct was turning down. Really? And it was offered to him. Sir Christopher Nolan flew out to meet him personally, tell him that he was the only person he imagined for the role, and that his larger-than-life persona would make the idea of Tesla being a— building a cloning device believable. And upon hearing this, David Bowie said, all right then, I’ll change my mind, and he took the role.

[01:12:52] Trevor Long: I think Nolan was just a massive Bowie fan.

[01:12:54] Stephen Fenech: Uh, did you notice Bernard Fallon is an anagram of Alfred Borden?

[01:13:01] Trevor Long: Did not.

[01:13:02] Stephen Fenech: You remember he calls Birden Fallon is an anagram.

[01:13:05] Trevor Long: There you go.

[01:13:05] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, so he let us know that he’s in fact the same character, twin brothers sharing a unique life. What’s the meme? Uh, well, The Prestige, you’d have to have something of that, you know.

[01:13:16] Trevor Long: I mean, there’d be something about the disappearing birds.

[01:13:19] Stephen Fenech: I like the one where it says, no one cares about the man who disappears but the one who comes out.

[01:13:23] Trevor Long: Yes.

[01:13:24] Stephen Fenech: And I love the one of Hugh Jackman, Andrew, saying, how could he not How can you not know? How can you not? Seems to be a theme. Yeah, by any other name.

[01:13:35] Trevor Long: Well, I obviously could be called The Magician or the whatever, or the, the Transportable Man or anything. But see, I love this because it’s a part of the description of the craft. Yeah, it’s a, it’s a great name.

[01:13:46] Stephen Fenech: And funny enough, the same year was another film starring Edward Norton called The Illusionist.

[01:13:53] Trevor Long: Really?

[01:13:54] Stephen Fenech: Set in a similar period. Different store sort of story, but it was about magicians.

[01:13:58] Trevor Long: Jesus.

[01:13:58] Stephen Fenech: So imagine if this one was called The Magician and that was called The Illusionist. Oh my God, this one, this one had the right name. My, my ideas were A Magic Life, The Transported Man, could be Another Life, or The Pledge was another part of it, The Pledge. But The Prestige, I think— no, I think—

[01:14:15] Trevor Long: yeah, 100%.

[01:14:16] Stephen Fenech: What’s the one thing you want? Uh, I’ll take The Machine.

[01:14:19] Trevor Long: The Machine would take up a bit of space if I’m honest.

[01:14:21] Stephen Fenech: Top hat, one of the top hats. I mean, I’ll take Borden’s bullet catch gun, the little birdcage, birdcage as well, and one of the posters. Remember when they were promoting his performance? I’d take one of them. Okay, 3 questions for Trevor. I think you’ve answered this first one. Did you pick up the twists?

[01:14:39] Trevor Long: Some of them, not until the end. No, like it was, you know, 40 minutes, 41 minutes out. That’s a long time to, to be in, in on the gig.

[01:14:46] Stephen Fenech: I’ve got to say, first time I saw it completely fooled me. Didn’t pick it up, didn’t see it. Yeah, obviously rewatching it, you see, you know, right?

[01:14:54] Trevor Long: Like listening back to those clips, I’m like, oh my God, how do I know? It’s so obvious.

[01:14:58] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, it is.

[01:14:59] Trevor Long: But, uh, no, hidden in plain sight, they call that. Oh, so much so. Yeah, like there’s a magician helped this with this screenplay. Yeah, I think because there’s so many points where they go, oh, what about this? They’ll never notice.

[01:15:10] Stephen Fenech: Based on the novel, so I reckon there was— he had a bit of tease in there. Okay, question 2: could you follow the different timelines? How did that go? Didn’t really. That was—

[01:15:19] Trevor Long: I mean, I got the concept of it, but I didn’t know where I was at any point. Didn’t make it easy, did it?

[01:15:23] Stephen Fenech: Uh, question 3: too long, too short, or leave it alone? It was a little bit over 2 hours. Yeah, which for a Christopher Nolan movie is short.

[01:15:30] Trevor Long: Also, for a Trevor Long watch, is long. But no, I was good with this.

[01:15:34] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, fair enough. All right, that is The Prestige.

[01:15:37] Trevor Long: Give us your wrap-up and rate The problem with this movie podcast is this moment, like I’ve got to keep my secret, like The Prestige here. What? Because I would much prefer to be able to text you and go, I knew what was going on 40 minutes ago. And then at the end go, I was right, and tell you what I think of the movie. It’s hard to bottle this up.

[01:15:54] Stephen Fenech: Oh.

[01:15:55] Trevor Long: I thoroughly loved this movie. Like I legit enjoyed this movie to the point where again, I want to watch it again. In time I will, but it’s just, it just, it had so much because it was a great story of rivalry and regret and revenge and all that stuff, but then it had another whole twist to it and all that kind of stuff, man. It just had so much. It was just such a well-made movie in terms of the screenplay, the actors, how it was shot.

[01:16:21] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, it’s great, mate.

[01:16:23] Trevor Long: Great performances. It was excellent. Yeah, like, I, I, I know it’s not a hidden gem, but I, I just think this is an underplayed movie. I, I’ve got no doubt. I’ve got no doubt there’s people people. When was this released? 20 years ago, right? And this goes to that whole thing of this is something my 20-year-old son was born a month after this was released, right? Yeah. Like, you’ve got to watch this movie, buddy. It’s so good. It’s a great piece of content. And I think there’s— so there’d be 30-year-olds who were 10 at the time wouldn’t have seen it. That if you’re 30 and you enjoy art and great movies and stuff, this is a great watch. I feel like that’s what, that’s what you want to do is uncover that. So, mate, I loved it. It’s a 9 for me.

[01:17:01] Stephen Fenech: Wow. I’m an 8.5. There you go.

[01:17:03] Trevor Long: I’ve tied. I had this feeling I would be above you there.

[01:17:06] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. I think you know why? I reckon if I had seen this for the first time and I’m thinking, wow, that was amazing. I feel like that’s what you’ve got is— because I’ve seen it so many times. Yeah, yeah. And I sort of knew it going in this time. Yeah. That probably affects my score. I think it might. Yeah. I’ve got to go back to the sort of how I felt the first time I saw it.

[01:17:23] Trevor Long: I was— and honestly, my initial thought was 9.5. And I thought, mate, calm down, it was a good movie. But yeah, it’s— wow, that one landed, bro.

[01:17:32] Stephen Fenech: Good stuff. Yeah, well, let’s hope next week’s lands as well. Going back to 1973 for The Sting, okay, starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Thank you very much. Oh wow, great song. Uh, the theme, the, the theme music is The Entertainer. Okay, do you know, do you know what other show used that same music? No. Remember Paul Hogan when he was, uh, you know, that’s the sound. I did it pretty poorly, but pretty badly, but I knew what you’re doing. That’s the theme. Do you remember when Paul Hogan, remember he was the playing the drunk in The Paul Hogan Show?

[01:18:11] Trevor Long: I never saw The Paul Hogan Show.

[01:18:12] Stephen Fenech: What, you’ve never seen The Paul Hogan Show? No, you’re joking.

[01:18:16] Trevor Long: You’ve never seen Mad Nash. So stop it.

[01:18:18] Stephen Fenech: Come on. Anyway, The Sting, that’s the, the thing, but that’s not the question. The Sting was nominated for 10 Oscars. How many do you think it won? A, 1. B, 2. C, 5. D, 7.

[01:18:33] Trevor Long: A couple of good actors. B.

[01:18:36] Stephen Fenech: B was 2. Uh, that is incorrect. It actually won 7.

[01:18:39] Trevor Long: So C?

[01:18:40] Stephen Fenech: 7. No, that’s D. 7 Oscars.

[01:18:43] Trevor Long: 5. Oh wow, that’s pretty good. Wow, better be a bloody good movie then. It’s a cracker, man. That’s a lot of Oscars. It’s a classic. Can you give me— before you were born. Yeah, what am I, what am I leading?

[01:18:53] Stephen Fenech: Okay, it’s a, uh, Stephen Fenech trailer. Paul Newman and Robert Redford are sort of, you know, buddies and sort of your little schemers, and they’re working out a way to trick a wealthy gentleman. Okay, that’s what it’s called, The Sting.

[01:19:06] Trevor Long: Love it. I’m all in. Let’s go.

[01:19:08] Stephen Fenech: I think that’s where this originated. All right, The Sting, that’s next week, but I’m glad you really enjoyed The Prestige.

[01:19:14] Trevor Long: Bring it on. Talk to you next week.