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Follow the man behind the magic as he finds fame, engages in espionage, battles spiritualists and encounters the greatest names of the era, from U.S. presidents to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Grigori Rasputin.
Stars: Adrien Brody, Kristen Connolly, Evan Jones | See full cast and crew »
Type : MKV / Quality : High HD / Size :730 MB / language
Storyline:
Follow the man behind the magic as he finds fame, engages in espionage, battles spiritualists and encounters the greatest names of the era, from U.S. presidents to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Grigori Rasputin.
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plot:
I actually had quite high hopes for this two part Bio-pic of the great escapologist Harry Houdini. For one thing, being in two parts should give the narrative plenty of room for detail and development. It was also a "History Channel" production which I presumed meant it would focus on factual and not fictional incidents in Houdini's life. I even thought that the casting of Oscar-winner Adrien Brody would confer some gravitas on proceedings. Well, sorry to say I was wrong on every count.
I've done a little background research and can't see any evidence of Houdini's secret spy-work across Europe prior to World War I (far less break into the German Embassy's safe for valuable papers, during his own act), ringing the Kremlin bells for Czar Nicholas and his family, far less meeting Rasputin or do the bullet-catch trick in front of Kaiser Wilhelm. Houdini surely had such a fascinating life that there was no need for these fictitious sensational-isms. Even real-life events such as his exposure of the fraudulent medium Margery (with gratuitous seduction scene, natch!) or thevfall-out with the Conan-Doyle's seemed souped-up, to say the least.
I also hated the production values with its trendy post-"Sherlock" use of jump-cuts, time-compressions, internal anatomy close-ups and worst of all the booming cacophonous soundtrack employed presumably to accentuate dramatic scenes. Then there's Adrien Brody himself, that's tall, gangling Adrien Brody playing short stocky Harry Houdini. And just what were those far from platonic kisses with his adored mother all about?
No, I really hated this, it really did, for me encapsulate all that's bad in Hollywood representations of supposedly factual events. One day, we'll presumably get an accurate retelling of Houdini's fascinating life and times, but this assuredly wasn't it, not by a long chalk.
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