Even the most diehard rationalist, in his heart of hearts, longs to believe in magic. That's why Neil Burger's film The Illusionist, which tells the story of Eisenheim (Edward Norton), a fictional conjurer who enraptured Viennese audiences in 1900, rouses your slumbering belief in the miraculous.
Onstage, when Eisenheim makes an orange tree sprout from a seed and bear fruit, and a ghost materialize, then fade into vapor, your atavistic inner voice whines, "Please let it be so," even as your mind struggles to figure out how it was done.
This screen adaptation of Steven Millhauser's short story, Eisenheim the Illusionis, gives Norton a role that perfectly fits his disturbing inscrutability. His face, with obsidian eyes that take in everything but reflect nothing, and a tight little mouth, is an impenetrable mask of either innocence or cunning; you're never sure which. Only the corners of his eyes glint like icicles.
PHOTO COURTESY OF FOX
Few musical notes are buried in his flat, dry speaking voice, an ideal instrument for conveying an ominous inner deadness. Throughout the movie Eisenheim remains a man of mystery whose few, carefully chosen words project a wary, possibly phony omniscience.
Magic usually doesn't translate well onto the screen, since the movies themselves are larger-than-life illusions projected through thin air, especially in the age of computer-generated special effects, when every image is susceptible to endless manipulation. But the surreal, spiritualist feats Eisenheim executes, undiluted by obvious cinematographic embellishment, still produce a wow effect on the screen because they have an aesthetic elegance that transcends trickery. Even if they're fake, they look like works of art.
Storytelling is also a kind of conjuring, and The Illusionist, at least until its frantic final moments, is smart enough not to lose its cool and to stay out of the way of the entrancing yarn it spins.
That story has the quality of a supernatural Yiddish folk tale. As a boy, Eisenheim (Aaron Johnson), the son of a carpenter, has a chance encounter with a traveling, sorcerer-like old man, whose wondrous tricks inspire him to pursue magic.
An intense bond develops between the boy and Sophie von Teschen, the sheltered daughter of aristocrats who disapprove of Eisenheim. The sweethearts carry on a passionate secret friendship until they are discovered together and torn apart.
As they are about to be routed from their hiding place in the woods, Sophie begs him to make the two of them disappear, but his magic fails.
After wandering the world for 15 years, Eisenheim (now played by Norton) returns to Vienna in command of an astonishing bag of tricks. Sophie (Jessica Biel) is now the fiancee of the ruthless, arrogant Crown Prince Leopold (Rufus Sewell), who is scheming to become emperor. When he and Sophie attend an Eisenheim performance, she volunteers to be a stage assistant.
The former childhood sweethearts recognize each other, and Eisenheim notices she is still wearing a locket he gave her with his photo in it. Their old bond flares, and soon they begin a clandestine affair.
Also observing the performance is Chief Inspector Uhl (Paul Giamatti), the prince's hand-picked chief of police. Uhl is ordered to uncover the secrets behind Eisenheim's indecipherable magic after the magician boasts that he can make the prince disappear.
The role of an ambitious policeman from humble roots, who finds himself caught between an irresistible force and an immovable object, is a bracing change of pace for Giamatti, who invests Uhl with a gravitas that carries whiffs of Orson Welles and Claude Rains.
As Eisenheim delves increasingly into the occult and summons walking, talking ghosts, he attracts a growing cult whose members believe he is a miracle worker and harbinger of a "spiritual republic." This mystique further infuriates and threatens Leopold, who becomes obsessed with exposing Eisenheim as a fraud.
At a royal command performance, Eisenheim takes the prince's sword, balances it on its tip on the floor, evokes the myth of Excalibur and invites soldiers in the audience to remove it. The prince succeeds, but only after Eisenheim lifts the spell.
In Sewell's fiery performance, the prince is a dashing, scary control freak, who flies into Hitlerian rages when crossed. During one of those tantrums, he commits a murder, the investigation of which proves the ultimate test of Uhl's character.
If the parallel cat-and-mouse games Eisenheim plays with the prince and policeman have all sorts of political, religious and historical implications, The Illusionist, filmed in sepia, prefers to let them lie. This entertaining movie is content to be something a bit more modest: a pungent period folk tale that teases you until the very end.
At that point the film pretends to solve the riddles it has posed. But does it? Or is the ending just a fantasy? Either way, it doesn't much matter.
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