This is a film that got a release last month, but over the 4 weeks it was on show it only showed in a grand total of 16 screens. So having completely died without apparantly getting near me I decided to see it online because it did interest me (I read an interview with Guy Pearce promoting the film). It's about Harry Houdini (Pearce), who after the death of his mother years before is exposing psychics by challenging them to tell him his mother's last words before she died. The story follows a local mother and daughter team of scam artists (Catherine Zeta Jones and Saoirse Ronan) who attempt to take him for the $10,000 reward.
It's a pretty nice ensemble. Jones is decent, she's not great but she's very competent and does what the role requires of her (including a Scottish accent). Ronan is very nice here, I wasn't *that* impressed with her in Atonement (I thought she was fine but not "let's nominate her for stuff"-good) but she's better here, more natural, I liked her. Tim Spall gives his usual Tim Spall-ish turn as Houdini's business manager, but really, in spite of all this, Guy Pearce is the movie. His Houdini is very impressive, he's such a chameleon of an actor and I never once spotted him acting or doing something I've seen him do before, it's truly first rate stuff.
The film is generally well put together, I was a little worried about the tone for the opening reel or so but it settles down nicely and rattles along quite quickly (it's quite engaging too so that exaggerates the pace). The sets and costumes evoke the period very nicely, the score is not exceptional but functional. It would have been interesting seeing a really top-drawer director have a go at this, but Gillian Armstrong does a fairly good job overall - the odd slip here and there or lack of subtlety but she gets the performances so I can't be too critical.
Quite honestly though I'm at a loss why this was on 4 screens a week for a month - it's got name actors in it, it's a biopic so the subject is known, somewhere along the line the producers have messed up the distribution and that's just sad because this is a more than solid, entertaining film which frankly deserved much better handling than it received. I've had to resort to seeing it online (dvd quality though so it wasn't a hardship), had I been given the opportunity to pay to see it I would have done it and I would have considered it money well spent as it was a good watch. I just don't understand how things like this get mishandled so badly, it's a real shame - if you get the chance give it a whirl, it's a very decent film even if it is destined to become obscure.