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The 2013 comedy The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is a severely underrated comedy that works thanks to a clever story, a razor-sharp screenplay, a first rate-cast and some terrific magic effects.
Steve Carell plays the title character, an arrogant and obnoxious magician who finds himself at a loss when he has a falling out with his longtime partner, Anton (Steve Buscemi), losing his permanent gig at Bally's Casino in Las Vegas and forcing a fateful encounter with the magician (Alan Arkin) who was his childhood idol.
I hadn't heard a lot of great things about this movie prior to seeing it, but I have to admit I enjoyed this film thoroughly. Jonathan M. Goldstein and John Francis Dailey's screenplay is a little long-winded but rich with comic dialogue that had me on the floor for most of the running time, stemming not only from some great physical comedy but an on-target character study of the title character as we watch grow from clueless and obnoxious show business snob to actual human being...I love when he loses his suite at Bally's and is shocked to learn that room service doesn't deliver outside of the hotel.
Director Don Scardino has a sharp comic eye and a definite talent for casting the right actors in the role, even when they are cast against type like Buscemi. Carell is fall on the floor funny as one the most obnoxious characters he has ever played and he and Buscemi make a credible comic team. Olivia Wilde was a lovely leading lady, displaying some surprising comic timing which I didn't see coming. The late James Gandolfini also garnered laughs as the owner of Balley's, but if the truth be known, the best performance in this film came from Jim Carrey, doing a dead on takeoff on magician Criss Angel that was almost a little frightening in its accuracy, kind of like his Andy Kaufman in Man on the Moon, but always, always funny and surprising because Carrey has done quite a few stinko movies in the last decade or so, but maybe Scardino found the secret...give him a key supporting role where the film doesn't rest entirely on his shoulders because it sure worked here.
I also found it interesting watching Carell doing scenes with Arkin, the man who stole the Oscar Carell should have won for Little Miss Sunshine, but Carell's respect for Arkin as an actor was clear in every moment they shared onscreen. This was a deliciously entertaining comedy with a story that comes full circle to a very satisfying conclusion.
The 2013 comedy The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is a severely underrated comedy that works thanks to a clever story, a razor-sharp screenplay, a first rate-cast and some terrific magic effects.
Steve Carell plays the title character, an arrogant and obnoxious magician who finds himself at a loss when he has a falling out with his longtime partner, Anton (Steve Buscemi), losing his permanent gig at Bally's Casino in Las Vegas and forcing a fateful encounter with the magician (Alan Arkin) who was his childhood idol.
I hadn't heard a lot of great things about this movie prior to seeing it, but I have to admit I enjoyed this film thoroughly. Jonathan M. Goldstein and John Francis Dailey's screenplay is a little long-winded but rich with comic dialogue that had me on the floor for most of the running time, stemming not only from some great physical comedy but an on-target character study of the title character as we watch grow from clueless and obnoxious show business snob to actual human being...I love when he loses his suite at Bally's and is shocked to learn that room service doesn't deliver outside of the hotel.
Director Don Scardino has a sharp comic eye and a definite talent for casting the right actors in the role, even when they are cast against type like Buscemi. Carell is fall on the floor funny as one the most obnoxious characters he has ever played and he and Buscemi make a credible comic team. Olivia Wilde was a lovely leading lady, displaying some surprising comic timing which I didn't see coming. The late James Gandolfini also garnered laughs as the owner of Balley's, but if the truth be known, the best performance in this film came from Jim Carrey, doing a dead on takeoff on magician Criss Angel that was almost a little frightening in its accuracy, kind of like his Andy Kaufman in Man on the Moon, but always, always funny and surprising because Carrey has done quite a few stinko movies in the last decade or so, but maybe Scardino found the secret...give him a key supporting role where the film doesn't rest entirely on his shoulders because it sure worked here.
I also found it interesting watching Carell doing scenes with Arkin, the man who stole the Oscar Carell should have won for Little Miss Sunshine, but Carell's respect for Arkin as an actor was clear in every moment they shared onscreen. This was a deliciously entertaining comedy with a story that comes full circle to a very satisfying conclusion.