The Prestige
Essay Quote Book
Michael Caine’s Opening and Closing Speech:
Cutter: Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is
called "The Pledge". The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of
cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to
inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course... it
probably isn't. The second act is called "The Turn". The magician takes the
ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you're
looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're not
really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you
wouldn't clap yet. Because making something disappear isn't enough; you
have to bring it back. That's why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest
part, the part we call "The Prestige".
Angier’s love of magic:
Cutter: You're a magician, not a wizard
Angier: No one cares about the man in the box, the man who disappears.
Borden: Does he enjoy taking his bows under the stage?
Angier: You never understood, why we did this. The audience knows the truth:
the world is simple. It's miserable, solid all the way through. But if you could
fool them, even for a second, then you can make them wonder, and then
you... then you got to see something really special... you really don't know?...
it was... it was the look on their faces...
Angier: My passion is equal to the task.
Angier’s Obsession:
Angier: The man stole my life. I steal his trick.
Angier: I thought you said I'd have to get my hands dirty.
Cutter: Maybe someday you will; I just needed to know that you could.
Borden: You're not afraid to get your hands dirty anymore, are you?
Olivia: He says that it's even between you.
Angier: Even? My wife for a few of his fingers?
Olivia: It won't bring your wife back.
Angier: I don't care about my wife. I care about his secret.
Borden: You went half way around the world... you spent a fortune... you did
terrible things... really terrible things Robert, and all for nothing.
Borden: Living the Act:
Borden: The secret impresses no one. The trick you use it for is everything.
Borden: Never show anyone. They'll beg you and they'll flatter you for the
secret, but as soon as you give it up... you'll be nothing to them.
Borden: ...the point is... a real magician, tries to invent something new, that
other magicians are gonna scratch their heads over, you know?
Borden: I'm part of the bloody act, you fool!
Borden: See? He's fine!
Boy: But where's his brother?
Borden: He came in to demand an answer and I told him the truth. That I have
fought with myself over that night, one half of me swearing blind that I tied a
simple slipknot, the other half convinced that I tied the Langford double. I can
never know for sure.
Borden’s Family Life:
Borden: We both had half of a full life, which was somehow enough for us. But
not for them
Borden: So... we go alone now. Both of us. Only I don't have as far to go as
you. Go. You were right, I should have left him to his damn trick. I'm sorry. I'm
sorry for a lot of things. I'm sorry about Sarah. I didn't mean to hurt her... I
didn't. You go and live your life in full now, all right? You live for both of us.
Borden: Everything's going to be alright, because I love you very much.
Sarah: Say it again.
Borden: I love you.
Sarah: Not today.
Borden: What do you mean?
Sarah: Well some days it's not true. Maybe today you're more in love with
magic. I like being able to tell the difference, it makes the days it is true mean
something
Sarah: I know what you really are. And Alfred, I can't live like this.
Borden: Oh, you think I can live like this? You think I bloody enjoy, living like
this? We have a beautiful house, lovely little girl, we're married, what is so
wrong with your life?
Borden: Well, what do you want from me?
Sarah: I want... I want you to be honest with me. No tricks, no lies, no secrets.
Do you... do you love me?
Borden: Not today. No.
Olivia: You married her. You had a child with her.
Borden: Yes. Part of me did. But the other part... the other part didn't. The part
that found you, the part that's sitting here right now.
Olivia: You could be in some other cafe saying the same thing about me right
now. It's inhuman to be so cold.