Watching the Film
Prior to the first day of this unit, inform students that they will have a chance to share any "magic tricks" they know. They will have to have all tricks approved by you. On day one of this unit, open the class by having students perform their tricks, then lead a discussion about students' experiences with magic shows/magicians. (Why are people so fascinated with illusion if there is obviously a rational explanation to the trick? What do people hope to gain by watching a magic show?)
Spend several class periods watching the movie. Remind students throughout the viewing that, even though this is a film, we are still able to examine it and analyze it like we could any piece of literature. This is why this unit is called "Film as Literature." The goal for these next several class periods is to develop the very important skills of analysis and critical thinking.
Discussion by Theme
Themes:
Natural talent vs. envious showman (goes back to motivations)
Desire
Identity
Sacrifice
Duality
Keeping a secret
Illusions
Revenge
Plot and Chronology
- What is the opening line?
- Who is the narrator at the beginning and end?
- Does Borden truly not remember which knot he tied?
- What kind of machine does Tesla build for Angier? (cloning, teleportation, etc.) Was there really ever a cloning machine? (Was the whole part about cloning only a narrative in the journal because Angier wanted Borden to believe he could truly perform magic?)
- What happens in the court scene? Who is Cutter defending? What does he say?
- Why is most of the story told in flashbacks?
- Can we trust Borden's and Angier's diaries? - (Both diaries turn out to be crafted for the other magician).
- How is irony used in this story?
- Who is the protagonist? Who is the antagonist? (Interestingly, there really doesn't seem to be either.)
- Are any characters heroic? With whom do you sympathize the most—with Angier or Borden?
- What are the "plot twists?"
- How are the major plot twists foreshadowed?
Desire and Sacrifice:
Borden makes a similarly costly sacrifice by living his act, day-in day-out. He is willing to give up his identity (essentially forming a real life around the facade of his act), which ultimately leads even greater losses—the loss of fingers, Sarah, Olivia, family, happiness, and his twin's life. Explaining why Borden so quickly knows the old man's secret, Jay Dyer writes, "It was all an act, because that is true devotion to the art, and true devotion to the art is the only way to 'escape all this' (as he pounds on a rock wall). On one level, Borden was referring to his life of poverty, but on a deeper level, it is a reference to the film’s continual usage of bird cages, water tanks and boxes."
What is Borden's motivation for sacrificing an authentic life for a "fake" one? Although he sacrifices nearly everything, was Borden's sacrifices worth it? Does he achieve what he desires?
Angier makes sacrifices as well. His desire for revenge drives him to sacrifice his applause from the audience when he hires a double (as he must experience it under the stage). However, he also has a desire for greatness and glory, so he is willing to sacrifice a fortune on Tesla's machine. Eventually, he is drowning and sacrificing a version of himself every night (essentially suicide).
Is it always a clone "appearing" out of the box, with the "original" Angier drowning himself? Why would Angier sacrifice himself...What does he want to accomplish? If he (or his clone) is willing to die for this act, why does he put up a fight when Borden finds him drowning? Why doesn't Angier just create one clone of himself and reuse it over and over, rather than cloning and killing himself every night? Possible answers: he couldn't have two "Angiers" competing for the applause at the "prestige." Angier is more committed to true magic over mere illusion. He ends up making a sacrifice greater than Borden could ever make and gets his "hands dirty." Furthermore, if he wanted to use the act to frame Borden for murder, perhaps he didn't know which night Borden would make his way down below the stage. He had to kill himself every night until Borden came down and saw it.
When Borden is in prison, why would Angier still be trying to get Borden's method after having reproduced the trick with the Tesla machine? He's been duplicating himself successfully for months - why does he still want Borden's secret?
Dualism, Appearances, and Identity
How Borden dies, how Angier dies.
Why was Angier not content to perform The Transported Man with a double (Mr. Root)?
Secrets
Why didn't Borden tell his wife his secret rather than letting it ruin their marriage? How do you think the other Borden twin felt in this situation?
Entrapment
Who do you most sympathize with—Borden or Angier?
Technology & Magic
*Historical background of Tesla*, the father of the modern technology we have today. In the movie, his scientific advances created greatest illusion ever—a truly transported man. Cutter says, "This machine was not built by a magician, but by a wizard." It is this technology that fed Angier's obsession. It led to the destruction of both Angier and Borden. Little did those audiences know they were being entertained by one of the most powerful and destructive machines ever. But did they really care to know? They wanted to be fooled. They didn't really want to know what the machine did.
Do we experience as kind of "magic" today as a result of technology? Is there any kind of "illusion" (inauthenticity, an alternate reality, ect.) this technology brings to our lives? What kind of things do we want to be fooled by today?
"Meta-cinema" (similar to the idea of metafiction in literature) is a mode a filmmaking where the film itself acts as a "comment" on the art of film itself. In a broad sense, meta means "self-aware"; so a meta-cinematic film that knows it's a film. This kind of film might acknowledge itself or acknowledge the audience.
Watch this video:
So, even though there are meta-cinematic elements to Nolan's movies, he seems to want to avoid being directly meta-cinematic. You have to examine his films closely to really see what his films are saying about film itself. Why does he do this? According to this video: the immersion of the audience into the narrative.
In the first scene, the audience is shown the title of the film, "The Prestige." But they are also literally shown the prestige (the final part of every magic act), which are the copies upon copies of the magician's hats. Right from the beginning, we're given the key to understanding the prestige of the magic trick—duplicates!
To quote the Nerdwriter1 video above, "The Prestige is all about a trick that moves its object through time and space instantaneously. Well, this is exactly what all film editing does. Most editing cuts between short distances and continuous times with a simple cut. But that same simple cut can traverse great distances also and great lengths of time—in either direction." It is necessary for The Prestige to use this kind of complex narrative structure, cutting "seamlessly" between time and characters, in order for it to maintain the audiences "suspended disbelief" and "keep its twists secret until the film wants to reveal them."
Why do most of us "want to be fooled" when it comes to watching movies? What does that mean?
Again, an important point about meta-cinema from the video: "As the boy sees into the bird trick, we can see into cinema. We're accustomed to taking most editing for granted; but, the way stories are told—the tools of any story-telling medium—in large part determine the way we construct our own memories (shared or personal)."
I like how Jay Dyer puts it, writing, "The Prestige follows this same tripartite structure, as it draws you into an ordinary story of human rivalry and obsession, the Turn, where the audience is looking for the secret of Angier and the Borden’s trick, but not truly looking, because like film, stage magic operates under the audience’s suspension of disbelief. The audience 'wants to be fooled.' And in the end, the transported man must come back – reemerge or resurrect, as the final climax of the show."
Finally, to sum up the discussion of meta-cinema in The Prestige, watch this video:
What is the "prestige" of The Prestige? What does the film say about the purpose of magic? What is the film's overall message?
“Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called “The Pledge”. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course… it probably isn’t. The second act is called “The Turn”. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you’re looking for the secret… but you won’t find it, because of course you’re not really looking. You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn’t clap yet. Because making something disappear isn’t enough; you have to bring it back. That’s why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call “The Prestige”.”
The Pledge
The Turn
The Prestige
"The Prestige example at number 1 is the most egregious: it misses a key point of revelation about the differences between Angier and Borden. Angier has in fact used a double in the past, but the man was out of his control. As a performer, he desired for the audience to experience "real" magic each time on stage. Angier's notion of sacrifice is quite literal. He would give up his life so that his audience can experience the wonder of witnessing real magic (and it is telling that he would punish himself by confining himself to the same drowning fate as his beloved). In that moment on stage, he and the audience get to believe that the world is not "solid all the way through" but that there is some afterlife where his lost beloved might still exist.
Angier says near the end of the movie, “The audience knows the truth: the world is simple. It's miserable, solid all the way through. But if you could fool them, even for a second, then you can make them wonder, and then you... then you got to see something really special...”
The film itself works in much of the same manner. Its first act – the pledge – introduces us to the setting and characters. In the second act – the turn – the story and participants enter the domain of the extraordinary, and the final act – the prestige – reveals the films shocking secrets. However, unlike a real magician’s three-act performance, THE PRESTIGE goes at length in its closing minutes to explain all of the answers to the film’s puzzles. This approach, in some ways, feels a bit counterproductive. Perhaps a more satisfying - and eventually intoxicating - choice would have been to make the audience try to find out answers for themselves.
End of Unit Project
Along with the poster, students should write a paper explaining the significance of the symbols/motifs chosen and how the meaning of those symbols/motifs relate to the larger themes of the film. How do those symbols impact the film's message?
http://www.avclub.com/article/prestige-plays-trick-its-audience-hiding-secret-pl-232247
Resources for Teaching Analysis
Teaching Literary Analysis
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