The Incredible Burt Wonderstone stars Steve Carell as a traditional magician Burt Wonderstone whose performance is being rivalled by a popular street magician. The movie also stars Steve Buscemi as Burt Wonderstone’s assistant and Jim Carrey as street musician Steve Gray.
Steve Carell’s performance as Burt Wonderstone is not his best but he does make the character funny and likeable, the same can be said about Steve Buscemi. When I first saw Jim Carrey as the extreme Steve Gray I thought “oh this will be good” and while he was funny in the role, I wasn’t laughing out loud like I would usually get from Jim Carrey.
Although the film was entertaining on the whole with the odd funny scene, it sadly didn’t amount to anything great. I kept expecting these really funny moments to turn up but the comedy isn’t as clever as we should normally see from this cast. Alan Arkin plays an old retired magician who teaches Burt Wonderstone the ultimate magic trick as well as change his ways as a person, pretty cliché.
A lot of the plot was predictable which retracted a lot from the entertainment but it did have heart. The ultimate magic trick was cool though, I was unsure what they would do but magic has that great way of surprising you. I was impressed by a lot of the tricks in the movie and was glad to hear that most of them were actually shot with practical special effects rather than digital effects.
In conclusion, I enjoyed the film but it wasn’t anything special. I was a little disappointed as I know the cast can do better if the story wasn’t so predictable. I still had the odd laugh but that was all it amounted to.