| | Tony Curtis will amaze and astound you with one of his best performances as Harry Houdini, "the man of 10,000 tricks." Houdini has nothing up its sleeve, but the charismatic Curtis and Janet Leigh ("Hollywood’s Most Exciting Young Lovers," proclaims the film’s original trailer, the sole bonus feature on this disc), as Houdini’s wife, Bess, levitate this conventional, albeit enormously entertaining 1953 biopic that follows the legendary magician and escape artist from his days as a sideshow attraction to international stardom. Houdini dedicates his life to giving audiences "bigger and bigger thrills," and the film’s best scenes recreate Houdini’s act and death-defying escapes, including a harrowing plunge into the frozen Detroit River while locked in a trunk. Houdini’s fate is well-known, and while the film plays loose with the facts, it does conjure up an eerie foreboding by the time he takes the stage for his final, ill-fated Halloween performance. After Houdini’s first strait-jacket escape, an elderly magician urges him, "It’s isn’t a trick. Drop it. It will make you famous, but it will kill you." At long last available on DVD, Houdini is old fashioned movie magic that’s no trick and all treat.--Donald Liebenson More...
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