Magic (1978)

Instant Favorite.

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Struggling magician Corky Withers (Anthony Hopkins) develops a ventriloquist act involving a foulmouthed dummy called Fats (who looks like an even creepier version of Hopkins), after which his career finally starts to takes off. Unfortunately, Corky's fragile mind cannot handle the strain of two personalities, and begins to crack, turning him into a dangerous psychopath who believes that his dummy is alive.Scary dolls are a staple of the horror genre, but are rarely enough to carry a whole film. It's a good job, then, that Magic has plenty else going for it, not least a smart screenplay by best-selling writer William Goldman (adapted from his 1976 novel), excellent direction from future Oscar winner Richard Attenborough, and a great cast. Anthony Hopkins (another future Academy Award winner) is thoroughly convincing the mentally unstable conjurer Corky, the star mastering the art of throwing his voice and card tricks for the part, and he is given able support by the brilliant Burgess Meredith as concerned agent Ben, and from the beautiful Ann Margaret as love interest Peg.The film isn't so much scary as it is unsettling, and might disappoint some horror fans looking for jump scares or gory spectacle, but as a study in madness, it does very well indeed. 7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb.

Corky Withers is a struggling and not very successful stage magician until he comes up with the idea of combing magic with ventriloquism. He effectively forms a double act with his dummy, Fats, and the two prove a huge success. The gimmick behind the act is that Corky and Fats have completely different personalities. Corky on stage is a shy, diffident, self-deprecating young man. (Anthony Hopkins was forty at the time the film was made, but seems younger). Fats, by contrast, is a brash, cocky, wise-cracking loudmouth, ever ready to crack some bawdy joke, generally at Corky's expense. Corky is offered his own television show, but instead of signing runs off to the Catskill Mountains, where he grew up, and is reunited with his high-school sweetheart, Peggy Ann Snow, who is now unhappily married, and the two begin an affair. He is, however, unexpectedly joined in the Catskills by his agent Ben Greene, who is determined to find out the truth about Corky's sudden disappearance. And that truth is strange indeed. Corky is frightened that Fats has got out of control and has started to take over his life. By this I do not mean that the dummy is literally alive or that it has been taken over by an evil spirit like the doll in the "Child's Play" films. This may be a horror film, but it is a non-supernatural horror film in which everything that occurs has a rational explanation and which concentrates more upon psychology than upon gore. I do not even simply mean that Fats represents those aspects of Corky's personality which he has been trying to suppress. The truth is that Corky is mentally ill and suffering from schizophrenia. He uses Fats- with whom he holds conversations even off-stage- to express the other half of his split personality, and it is this, potentially violent, half which is getting stronger. When Greene discovers the truth and Peggy's husband starts to get jealous, Corky is tipped over the edge into violence. What surprises me about this film is how little-known it is, even though it was made by a well-respected director Richard Attenborough, and stars Hopkins, today widely regarded as one of the world's leading screen actors. Indeed, I had only vaguely heard of it until I caught it on television recently. Another thing that surprises me is that Hopkins was only the third choice for the role, although possibly in 1978 he was less well known than he is today, at least in America. The first choice, Jack Nicholson, turned it down. The second choice, Gene Wilder, had the support of both Attenborough and screenwriter William Goldman, but was vetoed by the producer who did not want an actor more associated with comic roles. We cannot, of course, know how the film might have turned out had either Nicholson or Wilder been cast, but I think that whoever was responsible for casting Hopkins made the right choice, because he is absolutely superb, as good as he was to be in better-known films such as "The Elephant Man", "Shadowlands" (also made with Attenborough), "Howard's End" and even "The Silence of the Lambs", for which he won an Oscar. Because of Corky's mental illness this is essentially a dual role as Hopkins has to convey quite different personalities, Corky's "normal" personality and the one he expresses though Fats, at the same time. He even has to use two different voices.( For all its vulgarity and the mayhem it leads to later, the "Fats" personality is initially an engaging one; it is clear why Corky's act was such a success). Hopkins receives good support from the lovely Ann-Margret as Peggy and Burgess Meredith as Greene.Attenborough's direction and Goldman's script are also first rate. The scenes set in the Catskills have a melancholy, autumnal quality which fits in well with the mood of the film. Without wanting to give away too much of the ending, I can say that in the final scene the talents of Hopkins, Attenborough and Goldman all combine to produce something genuinely moving. The term "neglected masterpiece" is perhaps over-used in the cinema, but in the case of "Magic" I can say that it is indeed appropriate. This is one film that really does deserve to be better known than it is at present. 9/10

Magic is a solid horror-thriller directed by Richard Attenborough that suffers from bad casting. Hopkins is not entirely convincing as the all American ventriloquist. Ann Margaret is not adorable enough as his childhood love. But Burgess Meredith was sensational. He is almost like a special effect in this film. He literally upstages Hopkins when they are together in the same scene.I liked the locales when Hopkins runs away from society. I thought this film was about a misanthropic man who runs away from society to hide his limitations/idiosyncrasies. But the society keeps creeping up on him. And he has no other alternative but to resort to violence. The film could have used more character development. We are not told what happened to Rusty in his childhood. The part about his childhood is too vague.The film has a very affecting great score by Jerry Goldsmith. I've read the book by William Goldman a long time ago. Good stuff.(7.5/10) ▲

Magic is a film about a man who had a psychological problem, he had double personality disorder, and he lived out his second persona through a ventriloquist's dummy named Fats. The whole movie boils down to one character and that is Corky (Anthony Hopkins), it was important that he made his portrayal strong, because the whole movie is about him and him alone and how he was finding it hard to live his life without his Dummy Fats.The part in the movie that was really stood out for me was the scene where Corky and Ben sat face to face, and Ben asked Corky to sit 5 minutes and not let Fats speak a word at all, the whole 2 minutes it lasted was just intense, with you thinking, "Is he going to break?" "When is he going to break?"Magic is a clever movie one that we should all seewww.lagsreviews.com