Movie Review: Now You See Me 2

 

I used to do magic when I was in elementary school, but I retired after my second talent show where I made milk disappear and money multiply. That is why I first watched the movie Now You See Me and enjoyed it. When I heard they made a sequel I was really excited and I am glad I was able to watch it for this weeks review.

The movie starts out with us following a young Dylan (played by William Henderson) getting ready to watch his Dad perform his latest, most dangerous magic escape trick yet. As Thaddeus Bradley (played by Morgan Freeman) exclaims his doubts to the gathered audience and TV crews, Dylan has a moment with his Dad and syncs their watches together before he steps into the safe. We watch the safe get lowered into the ocean, and then focus on Dylan counting the seconds until his Dad reappears. When the time passes and his Dad has not come up, he starts to panic and rescuers rush into the river he was in. This is the point where Dylan starts his burning hatred towards Thaddeus.

It then goes to J. Daniel Atlas (played by Jessie Eisenberg) going under an underground subway track system. There he finds a symbol on some of the pillars and follows them to a door. In the door there is a well with broken mirror pieces inside. Atlas says that he wanted to speak with "The Eye", and a voice tells him some stuff to remember of which I cannot tell. After he is told this, he rushes back to his apartment where he finds one of the other magicians he knows from eight years ago, Lulu (played by Lizzy Caplan).

The acting was good for a sequel, but I expected a little more chemistry between the actors, so I was a little let down with that. I actually found that new comers Lizzy Caplan and Daniel Radcliffe brought fresh air to the movie. The one I was a little disappointed with was Brick Patrick, who played Chase McKinney. He had a loud and funny character at first, but after a while I grew tired and annoyed because he was playing his so extreme and cartoon like.

The plot was full of twists and turns, which was the charm of the first movie, so I expected it back in the second. However, I think they focused so much on that this time that the magic was lost a little from the movie. Then there is the fact that they focused so much on the hypnotizing part of it that I felt it took up much more of the movie than it should have, again losing some of the other magic. When they finally got back into what made the other movie so wonderful, the magic of the performances with the crowds, It was shorter than I had wanted it to be. Now with all this, I will tell you, I did enjoy the movie a lot. A couple of the twists I saw coming, but most others took me by surprise. I appreciate the touch of a more personal story going on with it as well.

Overall, most of the acting was pretty good, and the story was a little less as confusing as the things they said to hypnotize. Though there were some things that could have made the movie better, whether it be adding some things or removing them, I would rate this movie 8.5/10.