The Prestige

Alfred Borden has a twin, and "lives the act" even at home with his wife and child. He and the twin switch places often, with one portraying the other's assistant Fallon. This also explains why he seems to be two different people around his wife, who kills herself. The machine that Tesla builds for Angier turns out to be a cloning machine, which transports the clone in the process. So, each night Angier uses the machine onstage, he is actually cloning himself, with the copy falling through the trap door into a water tank and drowning. Angier uses this to frame Borden for his murder. Angier takes on the name Lord Caldlow and is granted custody of Borden's daughter after the trial, so apparently, he has suceeded in taking everything from Borden as he set out to do. At this point, Angier is still unaware that Borden has a twin. One of the Borden/Fallon twins is hanged for the crime, while the other returns to shoot Angier, setting fire to his dead body and the duplicating machine. As Angier is dying he states "You don't see where you are, do you?", and, as the fire burns, Borden/Fallon looks around and realizes that he is in the underground holding area for the water tanks with the dead Angier clones inside of them. We are then shown Borden/Fallon reuniting with his daughter who is with Cutter, (who knew that Borden was a twin the entire time). The movie ends with a quick shot of one of the dead clones in a water tank.

Joel Buhiire

Visible crew/equipment: When Angier goes to Tesla's laboratory and walks to the gate, on the far right side of the fence a figure can be seen, apparently holding something ahead. It seems to be one of the film crew holding a boom mike upright. (00:09:59)

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Ackerman: We'll have to dress it up a little. Disguise it. Give them enough reason to doubt it.

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Trivia: Christopher Priest, who wrote the novel that the film is based on, is reportedly a huge fan of the film and even thinks certain aspects of it are better than the novel.

Phaneron

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Question: In the very last shot before the credits, the camera has pulled back to reveal a row of tanks containing dead Jackmans. Does this imply that not only did the Tesla machine replicate Angier, but also the tank? One assumes then that Angier has had the forethought to place a floor between where he materializes and the newly replicated tanks appear.

Answer: As we see when Borden goes down under the stage to try to learn how the trick is performed, the tank is already in place before the machine is activated. Angier is using a large number of identical tanks, which is probably one of the deciding factors in only performing the trick a limited number of times.

Tailkinker

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