Now You See Me

Year: 2013
Genre: Heist thriller
Director: Loius Leterrier


Plot: Four David Blaine wannabes execute a series of heists while being pursued by a determined FBI agent.


The gist: Have you ever seen a heist movie where the thieves don't succeed? No? Well, me neither. Now You See Me does not change that unfortunately.

Did I just give away the ending? No, there are still a few twists here and there. I only wish it were interesting enough to make this film worth watching.

So we have four street magicians who each can do what David Blaine does so well (and better I might add) being recruited by a mysterious person to carry out high stakes robberies. A no-nonsense FBI agent teams up with an Interpol agent to catch them with the help of a magic debunker.

The problem here is most of the characters are either poorly written or not likable enough, with only Woody Harrelson's mentalist and Mark Ruffalo's FBI agent standing out. Louis Leterrier films the whole thing at such breakneck speed, the audience doesn't even get to enjoy or fathom completely what's going on before he moves to the next point, and the next, and so forth.

The twist itself is weak and overall makes little sense to what we just saw beforehand, at least for me it was.


The good: As mentioned, Ruffalo and Harrelson stand out. There's a decent car chase scene in the middle portion of the film. Melanie Laurent is all right as the Interpol agent but isn't given much to work with.

The bad: Jesse Eisenberg plays the Mark Zuckerberg version of David Blaine. Boring. Isla Fisher and Dave Franco are wasted. Michael Caine was wasted even more. Morgan Freeman was given a role much lower than what he's capable of. Someone a little younger would have been more suitable. And as above, the too quick pace, the lame twist, poor characters etc.


Verdict: Now You See Me trips over itself trying to be smart, and doesn't really offer anything new when it comes to heist films. Any excitement it generated vanished faster than the money the Blaine copycats stole. Skip this. (2.5/5)