The Good: Well-shot, Generally good acting, Interesting concept
The Bad: Plot becomes successively less interesting as the film progresses, Catherine Zeta-Jones's performance.
The Basics: Catherine Zeta-Jones and Guy Pearce star as a scammer and Houdini in Death Defying Acts, a quasi-romance with less magic than it has chemistry between the leads!
A few years ago, as Summer Blockbuster Season was progressing, I found myself in Maryland at one of my annual conventions having a conversation with one of the authors who attends the conventions. He's a real business savvy guy and in addition to writing, he buys the book rights for various movies and he makes good money that way. He was having a good weekend that weekend. Hellboy II: The Golden Army (reviewed here!) was coming out and that meant the book was going to sell and he'd have money coming in regardless of how many books he sold at the convention. He was so positive about how the returns on Hellboy II were projected to be that he didn't mind that the other film he had bought the book rights to, which was opening that same weekend in (he guessed) about three theaters in the U.S. That film was Death Defying Acts, based upon Harry Houdini's later life.
So, when my local library - which I love very much - suddenly got in Death Defying Acts, I found myself smiling and taking it out to view. After all, I like to broaden my horizons and sometimes the little art house films entertain and enlighten me. Sometimes. Unfortunately, Death Defying Acts was not one of the ones to wow me and it is mostly average, making it very easy for me to not recommend.
Mary McGarvie and her daughter, Benji, are living in Britain scamming locals as Mary poses as a gyspy psychic as part of her stage act. In fact, Mary has Benji work as a pickpocket and then researches the person they rob and the artifacts, returning them during her show as part of "messages from the other side." Mary is intrigued by Harry Houdini, who is on a world tour following the death of his beloved mother. Searching for one true psychic, Houdini is offering thousands of dollars to the psychic who can tell him what his mother's dying words were to him.
When Houdini arrives, he lives up to his offer to take a punch by anyone, a promise which leaves him with serious internal bleeding. He and Mary soon meet up and Houdini seems to be onto Benji and the scam the pair is running. Soon, though, Mary and Houdini hit it off in a way that encourages Houdini to risk the chance that she is scamming him. Mary, Benji and Harry frolic around the city as Mary prepares to either reveal her true ability (the plan is to rob the safe where Houdini has hidden an envelope with his mother's last words) or come clean with the man she is falling in love with.
Death Defying Acts is, quite simply, a boring movie. Far less about Houdini and any form of magic or even the art of scamming people, Death Defying Acts is a tired, period near-romance where the romance fails to develop into anything remotely interesting. Houdini is portrayed as a kindly man who wants to prove scientifically that psychic abilities exist - though his personal belief is that they do not. In Mary, he sees the chance to prove it one way or the other.
The most intriguing aspect of the film, though, is the character interactions between Houdini and Benji. While Harry and Mary begin a blase and obvious romance that is steaming under the surface, Houdini seems to have a genuine affection for Benji and soon treats her like she is his own daughter. Similarly, Benji has a clear respect for Houdini and a desire to not participate in scamming him. Still, the girl is desperate for her mother's love and attention and she continues her work to help her pull off the job, which ought to net them enough to live on for quite some time.
Mary McGarvie, though, is unlikable and fairly dull. She is emotionally distant to Benji and she has no real chemistry with Houdini, which is pretty much the death knell of this type of movie. Furthermore, Catherine Zeta-Jones is stiff in the role of Mary and this is not one of her more imaginative performances. She plods through the scenes, shot long and slow which further drags the film down, having no on-screen chemistry with Guy Pearce's Harry Houdini. There is something troubling about Pearce having more on-screen chemistry with Saoirse Ronan than Zeta-Jones, but there the role is more parental.
Guy Pearce delivers a good performance as Houdini. He plays the role with both charisma and a sense of brooding, which is appropriate because Houdini is depressed following his mother's death. Pearce does a good job of playing Houdini flamboyant on stage and somber in the scenes off-stage. He has the ability to frown his way through much of the film in a way that clearly emotes and expresses a deep-seated sense of loss for his character. Saoirse Ronan plays Benji and she is far more dynamic than her role in Atonement.
Director Gillian Armstrong paces the film with an irregularity that is problematic. Instantly intriguing, when the viewer knows who Mary is and how she works, the viewer's interest in the film dwindles. By the time Houdini appears in Mary's life in person, the viewer cares so little about her and her character that one has to wonder what Houdini comes to see in her. The most interesting aspect Armstrong illustrates are a series of hallucinations Houdini has while performing his magic tricks. While working to escape a water-filled box, for example, he sees a creepy eyeless woman - presumably his mother - who he nearly drowns studying.
While this is interesting for the viewer and explains Houdini's willingness to open to the possibility of Mary being legitimate, Pearce plays the role as the continual skeptic and the film falls flat as a result. On DVD, Death Defying Acts has a commentary track and previews for other films. Neither make it any more worth buying than the film on its own.
Far more about a strange relationship where Houdini accepts a scam artist in his life for the emotional benefit, Death Defying Acts is more boring than any form of revelation, cinematic or character-based.
For other works with Timothy Spall, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Part 1
The King's Speech
Alice In Wonderland
Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix
Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire
Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban
Nicholas Nickleby
Vanilla Sky
5/10
For other film reviews, please visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!
© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |
No comments:
Post a Comment