Then he should have loved The Prestige! Everyone in that movie ends up dead or miserable! Or both!

Well we were completely legally watching it at home and I got kind of bored about an hour in so I was half watching, half reading a book, so if there was some awesome stuff in the last half I may have missed it.

The whole thing was like "Oh we have everyone in swanky costumes and tophats, we don't even need to make a movie."
The rest of the movie was a big metaphor for a magic trick and just to make sure you got it that actually spell it out for you.
I mean yeah there was big plot twists and changes but they were put in as a stylistic too to extend the metaphor rather than as a plot in its own right and thus the whole movie was all just big distracting scenes to hide the weak current running underneath.
Which was kind of the point but it was totally annoying to watch and when you've watched movies by East German film students exploring shapes and what would happen if spoons were a square instead of thier current shape you know annoying to watch.

As for your metaphor, it's totally over my head but it sounds cool. I know quantum leap was this show and there was a guy and he would leap into the bodies of other people or something....

Go down to your local Blockbuster on Tuesday. Ask for the movie Death Racers.

You will see everything that is wrong in cinema.

It should be harder to get things released on DVD.

At this point I have to ask whether you in fact watched The Prestige as opposed to like, Moulin Rouge or Gangs of New York or some such. Every part of the movie not set on stage is so mundane as to be practically mired in it, which is basically the entire point. Hell, it's downright frumpy.

This is completely backwards. The movie wasn't a metaphor for magic, magic was the metaphor for and the tool used to talk about the limitations of humanity and humanity's drive to transcend those limits and the price to be paid for doing so and the ways in which people will still allow themselves to be driven to such excesses even when they believe they understand that price. The twists and turns were both in service to, and natural outgrowths of the main characters' obsession with, that theme.

Which isn't to say the story is not also a totally great analogue for a magic trick, because that's the kind of amazingly fantastic movie that The Prestige happens to be.

It's also also a metaphor for industrialism and modernity, which I don't even know how you miss when they've got Nikolai Tesla right there in the movie.

Mundane??????? See below.
I disagree. While you could make that argument, the ridiculous overblown nature of the whole thing completes wrecks any kind of plausiability. You have a teleportation machine, a completely anachronistic Tesla, the sudden appearance of twins, continual mistaken identity.. And the main problem is there was extensive speculation during the Victorian era as to things such as teleportation, body doubles, mimetic images and things. They could have easily included all the elements they included but with a Victorian feel so that the Victorian style of science-fiction was tapped. But it wouldn't be as dramatic so they didn't. And if you're going to make an argument about modernity and industrialisation the very LAST thing you won't to be is to be so ridiculous anachronistic. All of these devices were completely over the top and ridiculous which is why I made the claims that it's all about crazy scenes. I mean sure there is some character development and things but it's completely lost in all that stuff.
As for the characters themselves, they simply weren't convincing. It's almost as if someone read one of Wilde's plays, extracted a gentleman and the working class pub owner as the two opposed leads, a snide butler and the misplaced love interest who transcends the class divide. It's Victorian 101 and has all the depth of such. I don't see how the characters were different from pretty much every victorian film ever made. And if your main plot is about hubris then you need good characters.

Thought actually know that I think about it, my method of reading a book and watching the movie at the same time would just draw my attention to the most ridiculous over-blown scenes as these tend to distract so you may very well be right. I maintain that there is a lot of ridiculous overblown scenes in the name of style.

Yeah I'm not convinced. The Prestige was awesome. As Fifth points out, the metaphor goes both ways, and even outside of that? Just a damn-good entertaining movie.

Without getting into all of the above, just to pick out one particular thing as it's actually one of the things I liked most in the movie:

The twins' appearance wasn't at all sudden. They were depicted from the outset of the movie as separate characters with identifiably distinct motives and manners which become more and more pronounced as the story continues. Hell, they even give them different names (or at least one of them).

I could continue but I don't think we're going to get anywhere and I would have to watch the movie again to make a list of all the ridiculous cliched bits of every character but I really really don't want to do that.

Other terrible moments in film: The original Casino Royale. When you're on to your 6th director and have had huge actor turnoff it's a good time to stop. When you realise you are going to have to put together a film that was filmed to multiple scripts by multiple directors with most of the characters being played by multiple actors it is REALLY REALLY GOOD Time to stop.
Though I am a bit torn. It has an awesome post-modern feel and has some great little bits but it's also physically painful to watch. So it's either the most terrible movie ever made or the best movie ever made. I haven't decided.

Speaking of Casino Royale, I noticed you mentioned the 2006 movie earlier. Out of morbid curiosity, what didn't you like about that one?

A decided lack of neat gadgets. I mean the movie was all well and good, but I go to a Bond movie for Q gadgets and penis innuendo.