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Now You See Me | 2013 | PG-13 | - 4.5.5
The FBI and Interpol chase a notorious group called "The Four Horsemen," a team of renowned illusionists (Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco and Isla Fisher) who succeed in a series of heists against corrupt businessmen and then shower the stolen money on their audiences. Also with Melanie Laurent, Mark Ruffalo, Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman. Directed by Louis Leterrier. [1:55]
SEX/NUDITY 4 - A woman pulls her top off to reveal her bra, cleavage and abdomen as she kisses a man who tells her to go away and she does so, angrily. In a magic show, a woman stands on a platform and two assistants pull off her vest and trousers to reveal a silver sequined one-piece bathing suit that reveals cleavage, bare arms and legs; she wiggles her hips briefly and the crowd applauds. Several women wear deeply cut dresses, vests, or clingy V-neck tops that show cleavage. Some women wear very short dresses that reveal most of their thighs and lower legs. At Mardi Gras, an overweight woman begins to lift her blouse and we see a huge abdomen. A painting in a book features bare breasts on one female figure.
► In two scenes, a man and a woman kiss briefly.
► A male magician hypnotizes another man's angry wife and tells the man that if he ever goes on a business trip with the wife's best girlfriend for sex again, or even thinks of the friend, he (the husband) will immediately envision the male magician naked; the husband grimaces and pays the magician, who wakes up the wife and she smiles happily as she and her husband walk away. On a plane, a man tells a woman that he sees she has needs and he will be her personal "corkscrew" and she laughs. Four magicians practice mind reading and each one says, "Do me next, do me"; once it sounds like a double entendre when a woman says it. A man tells another man and a woman that they appear to have had a sexual relationship and they deny it. A TV host tells a man that he will soon "get laid."
VIOLENCE/GORE 5 - A magician dives into a tank of piranhas, shouts that she needs help and a man tries unsuccessfully to break the glass with a large pipe; the water turns blood red and the watching crowd screams, a woman in the crowd yells, "BS!" and people turn to see the magician standing there, wet but unharmed.
► Two men fight with kicks and punches resulting in broken glass and furniture and damaged walls: they seem to throw fireballs at one another, having rolled near a lit fireplace, and then stand up and swing at each other; one man escapes by throwing playing cards like ninja stars and the other a man is shown with bleeding cuts on his face; while in the kitchen, another man is stuck with his jacket sleeves pulled behind him and stuck into a running garbage disposer (he escapes unharmed).
► In an extended chase sequence, agents and a SWAT team chase four magicians on foot and then in cars; three fistfights end with police detectives handcuffed to each other as the magicians escape, cars swerve in and out of traffic on the streets and a highway and one car crashes into a bridge railing, rolls a dozen times and is left smoking and flaming until an agent rushes to pull out the driver but cannot do it and runs away when a giant explosion fills the screen with flames and smoke, blowing the agent and others out of the shot (we later see some blood on their hands and forehead); we hear the driver of the exploded car died (we do not see the body) and we later hear that he escaped alive.
► An Interpol agent points a handgun at an unarmed fugitive, but does not fire and the fugitive escapes. FBI agents break into a Las Vegas apartment and arrest four magicians, take them to headquarters and question them about a bank robbery. An FBI agent pulls a handgun and shoots at a magician on a crowded rooftop performance area when another agent knocks the gun off target as it fires; thousands of people are in the crowd, dancing and cheering loudly as play money falls all around them. In a parking garage, a man's SUV pops open and millions of dollars spew out of it; he stares blankly as several police cruisers pull up with sirens and lights and officers arrest him; we see him later in a small cell and hear that he will probably never be released. Four magicians run off a stage and a police officer pulls his handgun and yells "freeze" until a dozen men and women pile on top of the officer. FBI agents chase three people to a rooftop and tackle the only to find mannequins in their places. A man and a woman hide in an armored car in France and render two guards unconscious using pressure point techniques. A man grabs a woman's wrist as they stand at an empty bar, but she twists him around and slams his head into the bar top (we later see that his forehead is slightly scratched).
► A man jumps after another man down a garbage chute and they land in debris (the man being chased escapes).
► In a Las Vegas show four magicians choose a French man from the audience, they place an apparatus on his head and convince him hypnotically that he will teleport to his bank in France and steal all the money from the vault; the man stands in a device that makes him disappear and reappear on large video screen (supposedly in Paris) and French money rains down on the audience; the next morning a manhunt for the unknown thieves begins.
► A man points a voodoo doll at another man and wishes him bad luck; the second man says that the first man will have the bad luck and we later see the first man learn that he has lost 1.5 million dollars from his bank account and that it is showering down on the crowd around him as the crowd becomes a cheering mob, grabbing the money.
► In a park late at night, a carousel runs itself as three men and a woman watch; at the invitation of another man that appears out of nowhere, the four board the ride and disappear in a large bright light that fills the screen.
► Four magicians receive invitations to an event, printed on tarot cards containing skulls, banshees and the word DEATH; they all go to the event held in an abandoned and filthy apartment where they find a rose and a pitcher of water; by putting the flower into the pitcher, they trigger a 3D hologram with information.
► We hear that a magician locked himself into a faulty safe, was lowered into the Hudson River, and the safe disappeared; the insurance company refused to pay the grief-stricken family.
► A man steals a cadaver from a hospital morgue and we see the feet and a tagged wrist hanging out of the sheet on a gurney.
► In an empty warehouse room, a man breaks a glass wall with a sledgehammer, sending glass shattering to the floor.
LANGUAGE 5 - 1 F-word, 1 obscene hand gesture, 1 sexual reference, 16 scatological terms, 10 anatomical terms, 8 mild obscenities, 4 religious profanities, 4 religious exclamations, name-calling (fat, idiots, fools, Tranny, sucker, infidels, smug, 2-bit hustler, prissy, control freak, David Copperfield, stick-up man), stereotypical references to men, women, the police, the French, illusionists, skeptics, business people, Robin Hood, criminals, the poor, gays, transvestites.
SUBSTANCE USE - A man takes two Alka-Seltzer tablets in a cup of black coffee for a hangover headache. A crowded bar scene features a large dance floor with many men and women drinking beer from plastic cups and cheering as they watch a magic act, a few men and women drink whiskey from short glasses on airplanes, a man sits alone at a bar drinking a cocktail twice, many men and women in a crowded bar drink cups of beer and glasses of liquor, men and women drink beer and cocktails outside a bar in the streets, several glasses of wine sit on a dinner table and one man drinks his wine, and we hear that a man drank four beer bongs in a fraternity initiation.
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Magic, illusion, corrupt business, crime, consequences, beliefs, faith, justice.
MESSAGE - Magic requires belief and patience.
CAVEATS
Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.
We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.
Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.
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