I’ve missed Steve Carell. Sure he’s popped up in a couple of movies here and there – Seeking a Friend for the End of the World being his most recent sitting on my DVR unwatched – but ever since he left The Office there’s been a hole in the television landscape that’s been difficult to fill. It’s easy to take for granted just how funny he is when you’re spoiled with him on TV every week. It’s only when he’s gone – and anyone who’s continued to stick with The Office can attest to this – that you realize the occasional movie here and there just isn’t the same.
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, perhaps a little too aware of its stars talents, seems to be a tale of the two Steve Carell’s I love – the sweet, sincere, slightly nerdy Steve Carell capable of some genuine pathos and Steve Carell the buffoon, egotistical and small, there to be laughed at. Unfortunately, it’s exactly this embarrassment of riches that seems to hold the film back.
Either of these versions of Carell could have worked here, but in the movie’s attempt to utilize both at the same time the character feels like he’s being pulled in too many directions and the story suffers by proxy.
Burt Wonderstone starts out as bullied kid who turns to magic as a means of coping. Through a shared love of the craft he meets his friend Anton (Steve Buscemi) and we watch as the two of them rise up through the magic ranks to get their own show on the Vegas strip. Ten years later though their act has grown stale, and they’re beginning to be challenged by a new breed of shock magician, led by Jim Carrey’s Steve Gray. The two friends have a falling out and we watch Burt struggle as a washed up performer in unforgiving Las Vegas.
Of course, little development is put into any of this. Burt and Anton go from performing in front of large crowds to empty theatres with little explanation or discernible time lapse and the film seems to move through the rest of its plot like it’s an obligation rather than a means to entertain. Burt’s character in particular is wildly inconsistent and seems to undergo rapid personality shifts whenever the plot requires it.
Still, the movie is a comedy first and none of this is too debilitating. I think my main complaint about The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is that it just isn’t funny enough. There’s nothing wrong with the comedy per se – I get the impression that some of these jokes would have killed only a couple of years ago – but the movie tends to pick the low hanging fruit and it lacks that element of subversiveness that can put a good movie over the edge to great.
It’s not incapable of being funny. There’s a terrific epilogue where the movie reveals the nuts and bolts of Burt and Anton’s big final trick that ends up being great little piece of black comedy. But sadly these moments serve more to remind of what could have been than what was. For a movie that deals so closely with the theme of innovation The Incredible Burt Wonderstone doesn’t feel that innovative.
I didn’t mind Alan Arkin’s mentor character though, and despite it being a bit dated Jim Carrey had his moments with his parody of David Blaine/Criss Angel type magicians. I just wish Olivia Wilde’s Jane had gotten more development (which seems to be my complaint about most of the roles she plays). There were some interesting aspects to her character – mainly of the young female magician variety – that went unexplored in favour of the typical romantic shtick. And frankly, her lack of importance at the mid-way point of the film led to a bunch of distracting excuses to keep her character around long enough to pay off as the romantic interest.
In the end, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is a serviceable movie, but it’s not Steve Carell at his finest. While there are few fun moments here and there, the film tries to stretch its star in too many directions and the comedy falls disappointingly flat as a result. Now let’s all pat me on the back for going this entire review without making a pun about magic.
Seriously, I think I popped a blood vessel.