Now You See Me: Now You Don’t
The cunning and elusive magicians return for a third instalment in a considerable improvement on the last outing.
A fresh perspective: Dave Franco and Ariana Greenblatt
Photo by Katalin Vermes, Courtesy of Lionsgate.
Life is an illusion. The trick is to make us believe that it is real. There is enough sly trickery in this threequel to keep one entertained for much of the time, although some of it really is preposterous. Still, there are the glamorous locations and double feints, and a handsome cast, to make another outing worthwhile. The new setting is famous for its own settings, being the world of the diamond industry, the value of its product being an illusion in itself. At one point ace showman J. Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg) says, “magicians are entertainers, not superheroes,” and yet the Four Horsemen cannot help but use their skills to bring down the corrupt and fraudulent, often to the financial benefit of their adoring crowds. The Four Horsemen is the self-styled moniker of a quartet of illusionists who have pushed the possibilities of their craft to epic extremes, employing misdirection, forward planning and holographic technology to jaw-dropping effect.
The problem with magic performed on screen is that we know it is CGI and is thus anything but magic. The last outing, Now You See Me 2, was absurdly far-fetched, but the new director Ruben Fleischer (Uncharted) does bring an element of awe and fun to the table as his cast scurries around the world (from Bushwick to Abu Dhabi via Antwerp) hoodwinking their adversaries in ingenious ways (it’s amazing what you can do with mirrors and false panels). Not all of it is plausible, but a good deal more so than when Eisenberg vanished in a puddle in the last entry.
Now You See Me: Now You Don't also has a brand-new trio of magicians who are not as in awe of the Four Horsemen as the rest of the world and bring some fresh blood to the franchise. They think they know it all, and they are definitely smart, although they lack the experience of Atlas, Merritt McKinney (Woody Harrelson) and co, but their skills are just what Atlas needs in order to engineer the theft of the Heart Diamond, worth a cardiac-arresting $500 million. It is the property of a South African diamond enterprise run by the unscrupulous Veronika Vanderberg (a crystalline Rosamund Pike) who uses her business to launder the ill-gotten gains of arms dealers. She needs to be taken down.
With a score owing a debt to Henry Mancini, the film manages to sustain an element of sparkle as it zips across the globe, scattering red herrings in the path of the plot like trip wires. There is one extended sequence set in a French chateau which is pure magic, as each successive room reveals even more surprises and mysteries. There is an Escher chamber of wayward stairways and another room of false perspective (partly paying homage to Hans Holbein’s painting The Ambassadors), in which a subsequent brawl with police is genuinely inspired. It’s been nine years since the last film, and the narrative twists and turns of the new entry (dreamed up by a quintet of scenarists) do feel well thought out. There’s talk of a fourth instalment, with Fleischer due to return to the director’s chair, which might not necessarily be a bad thing.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco, Isla Fisher, Justice Smith, Dominic Sessa, Ariana Greenblatt, Lizzy Caplan, Rosamund Pike, Morgan Freeman, Andrew Santino, Mark Ruffalo.
Dir Ruben Fleischer, Pro Bobby Cohen, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, Screenplay Michael Lesslie, Paul Wernick, Rhett Reese and Seth Grahame-Smith, from a story by Eric Warren Singer and Michael Lesslie, Ph George Richmond, Pro Des David Scheunemann, Ed Stacey Schroeder, Music Brian Tyler, Costumes Sophie Canale, Sound Sam Fan, Dialect coach William Conacher.
Summit Entertainment/Cohen Pictures-Lionsgate.
112 mins. USA. 2025. UK and US Rel: 14 November 2025. Cert. 12A.
