Twenty years on, Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige still feels less like a film you watch and more like a trick being performed on you. It opened at No. 1 in the United States, earned $14.8 million in its first weekend, and has kept audiences arguing about its secrets ever since. As the film’s 20th anniversary approaches, these are the details even devoted fans may have missed.
Borden’s impossible trick hides a twin
Borden debuts a spectacular illusion, The Transported Man, in which he appears to teleport from one side of the stage to the other almost instantly. The film’s themes reveal that his obsession with maintaining the secrecy of his twin drives the story. Sarah grows suspicious of Borden’s secrecy and eventually takes her own life when she suspects the truth.
The novel reached Nolan on a London walk
In October 2000, Nolan travelled to the United Kingdom to publicize Memento, because Newmarket Films was having difficulty finding a United States distributor. While in London, he read Christopher Priest’s book and shared the story with his brother Jonathan while walking around in Highgate. That area later featured in the scene where Angier ransoms Borden’s stage engineer in Highgate Cemetery.
The script took five years, on and off
The writing process was a long collaboration between the Nolan brothers, occurring intermittently over a period of five years. The three-act screenplay was deliberately structured around the three elements of the film’s illusion: the pledge, the turn, and the prestige. Christopher Nolan told Variety that finding cinematic equivalents of the book’s literary devices was very complex.
It took a long time to figure out how to achieve cinematic versions of the very literary devices that drive the intrigue of the story.
The film changed the novel’s frame
Although the film is thematically faithful to the novel, two major changes were made during adaptation. The spiritualism subplot was removed, and the modern-day frame story was replaced with Borden’s wait for the gallows. Priest approved of the adaptation, calling it an extraordinary and brilliant script, a fascinating adaptation of my novel.
A Los Angeles theatre doubled as London
The historic Tower Theatre in Los Angeles was used as the location for the Pantages Theatre in London. After the release of Batman Begins, Nolan started the project again, negotiating with Jackman and Bale in October 2005. Josh Hartnett also pitched Nolan for a role.
The score mirrors the film’s three acts
David Julyan wrote the score after previously collaborating with Nolan on Following, Memento, and Insomnia. Following the film’s narrative, the soundtrack has three sections: the Pledge, the Turn, and the Prestige. ‘Analyse’ by Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke plays over the credits.
The rivalry had real magic-world echoes
Angier’s theft of Borden’s teleportation illusion echoes many real-world examples of stolen tricks among magicians. Outside the film, similar rivalries include magicians John Nevil Maskelyne and Harry Kellar’s dispute over a levitation illusion. The script also incorporates the popular notion that Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison were directly engaged in the war of the currents, running parallel to the duel between Angier and Borden.
The film chose not to pick a hero
Film critic Matt Brunson claimed that a complex theme of duality is exemplified by Angier and Borden. The film chooses not to depict either magician as good or evil. Den Shewman of Creative Screenwriting says the film asks how far one would go to devote oneself to an art.
It opened at No. 1, then became a re-release
Touchstone Pictures moved the release date forward by a week, from October 27 to October 20, 2006. The film earned $14.8 million on opening weekend in the United States, debuting at #1, and grossed $109 million worldwide. It received Academy Award nominations for Best Art Direction and Best Cinematography, and in July 2026 a theatrical re-release was announced for January 2027.
Which of these secrets surprised you? The Prestige’s real trick may be that the more you learn, the better the film gets. Tell us your favourite detail.
Facts from Wikipedia: The Prestige, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Film images from TMDB. This product uses the TMDB API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDB.
