Death Defying Acts

This beautiful 1920's period film is a must see by any standards. Producers Chris Curling and Marion Macgowan were proud to have Academy Award winner Catherine Zeta Jones play the fictitious role of Mary McGarvie, and Director Gillian Armstrong pays tribute to the degree of commitment Guy Pearce brought to the role of Harry Houdini appearing in Edinburgh in 1926, during the last year of his life. Academy Award Nominee, Saoirse Ronan adds sparkle to the action as Benji, the young psychic teenage daughter of Mary, reflecting the same beauty and composure of Catherine Zeta Jones.
A Scottish accent becomes Catherine, as sultry Mary, who delights theatre audiences by dancing in a Princes Lielia costume like a Belly Dancer, and faking psychic knowledge with the help of Benji dressed as a mini Rhaja, and objects she has pick-pocketed from the queuing audience. Still, they only earn a pittance, and so accept the challenge Houdini issued to any psychic who could tell him his Mother's last words, for a reward of £10,000.0.
Houdini was a great showman and publicist, beginning as an illusionist, and progressing to escapology after studying lock mechanisms. He would hold his breath chained under the sea, or in a tank of water, and claimed to have muscles of steel which could withstand any punch. This last activity is the one leading to his death in reality, when a blow ruptured his appendix, and after a weeks illness in Montreal he died on Halloween, October 31st 1926. Guy pearce worked out, and practised holding his breath for authenticity.
In the film, Mary bears a close resemblence to his mother, and a brief love affair develops after her audition for the challenge, but by a surprising turn of events, it is Benji who is the channel for the psychic phenomena.
Susannah Buxton designed the lovely 20's costumes, with 'Film Noir-esque' production design by Gemma Jackson, and haunting music by Cezary Skubiszewsky.
The action throughout is underpinned by the presence of Timothy Spall, as Houdini's manager, Mr Sugarman.

Based on a true story, set in Edinburgh, Scotland, it is set in the last few months of the great escapologist and magician Harry Houdini's life. This is NOT a film focusing on his whole life story as a magician or focusing on his magic skills (if you want to see that kind of film see The Prestige or The Illusionist).

This film is about how both a mother (a struggling psychic who is a fraud) and her 9 year old sidekick daughter see a competition advertised at the cinema offering £10,000 to anyone who can contact the dead and reveal the last words uttered by Houdini's dying mother. Houdini was a well known sceptic, however wanted to be proven wrong. The next stop on his world tour is Edinburgh, Scotland, and the mother and daughter team set out to out-con the great Houdini. Do they pull it off? Or do other distractions get in the way?

Fantastic performances from Guy Pearce and Catherine Zeta Jones. However Saoirse Ronan as her 9 year old daughter steals the show. Her acting is superb.

It's not surprising that Death Defying Acts never made it out of its extremely limited awards qualifying run or got much attention from critics or audiences. Gillian Armstrong's tale of the curious relationship between Harry Houdini (Guy Pearce) and stage psychic and Scottish con artist Catherine Zeta Jones and her daughter Saoirse Ronan is one of those films that's certainly enjoyable and engrossing to watch but never really develops into something you're likely to remember long after it's finished. The idea is moderately intriguing, with Jones taking up Houdini's real-life $10,000 challenge to tell him his mother's dying words, which are known only to him, and a subtle - perhaps too subtle - game ensuing and possibly developing into a love story. Both the audience and Houdini are wise to how she goes about her craft, though there's some mystery as to how she intends to take him and why he's so fascinated with her (especially when there's a very heavy hint that a pair of psychic twins he dismisses as fakes may be the genuine article when they hit a raw nerve). The stakes are clearly laid out fairly early in the game when the two fellow illusionists put their cards on the table: if she fails, she starves, if he fails he dies. But there's not much danger or obsession, with only a couple of genuine death defying acts from the master escapologist before the expected final revelation.

What's left to enjoy is, one unconvincing bit of CGi in the opening scene aside, a handsomely mounted period piece with a trio of superb lead performances and a good supporting turn from Timothy Spall as Houdini's pragmatic and protective manager. Like most magic tricks, it probably would have impressed more had it been made a good half a century earlier, but it still holds the attention until the inevitably tragic final curtain.