Magic in the moonlight (Colin Firth)

(Amazon UK link)

From time to time, Amazon recommends films to me, based on prior purchases. One of them which looked interesting a year or so back was the 2014 film  ‘Magic in the moonlight’, which stars Colin Firth. I put it on my wishlist, and had forgotten about it when I was given the blu-ray version for my recent birthday.

Colin Firth is best known for his Mr Darcy in the BBC ‘Pride and Prejudice’ film; he also seems to appear fairly often as a somewhat self-deprecating, slightly clumsy Englishman. So it was quite refreshing - and surprising - to see him as Wei Ling Soo, a suave, talented conjurer who stuns an audience in 1928 with his oriental routine. The film opens with him dressed as a tall Chinese magician, and we see, as his audience does, an elephant that disappears, and his finale when he vanishes from a box and reappears on a swivel chair.

He then shows himself as a rather big-headed and very irritable man called Stanley. He begins to remove his costume, criticises his assistants, and refuses to sign autographs or appear in photos with his fans. He knows he’s popular, he knows he’s brilliant, and he doesn’t care who he upsets.

Then he’s surprised - and pleased - when his old friend Howard (Simon McBurney) appears in his dressing room. They go back a long way, having studied conjuring together decades earlier. They go out for a drink, and Howard says he wants to ask a favour. He says there’s a young woman in the French Riviera who is telling fortunes and holding seances. Howard says that he is convinced she’s a money-grabbing charlatan, but has not managed to spot any flaws or tricks in what she does. He says that Stanley is more experienced, and asks if he’s willing to join him at a family mansion, and watch closely. 

Sophie (Emma Stone) is the young woman concerned. She’s there with her mother, who seems rather protective and somewhat controlling. The son of the household, Brice (Hamish Linklater) says he’s in love with her, and keeps serenading her with songs, accompanied on his ukulele. Sophie senses things about Stanley that surprise him, and as he starts to observe her closely, he begins to wonder if she really does have a gift. He’s always been a total unbeliever in anything beyond the physical world but he doesn’t mind acknowledging that he might have been wrong. 

There are some interesting conversations related to beliefs in the afterlife, in spirits and souls of the departed, and ectoplasm. They seem to be rather confused; as if either there is nothing beyond this world, or that everything possible might exist. For a short while it seems as if Stanley has undergone a spiritual conversion… 

Inevitably there are a lot of twists and turns in this very well-made, light-hearted film. It’s billed as a romantic comedy, directed by Woody Allen, and it’s slick and cleverly done. There are some moments of humour which made us smile, though I don’t recall laughing aloud. And there’s evidently a budding romance which looks doomed to failure. Even though eventually a declaration is made, towards the end of the film, it seems like a bad mis-match in terms of age, beliefs and general attitudes. But perhaps that’s over-thinking.

The scenery is beautiful, and the pace of the film just right for our tastes. The story is rather different from most rom-coms, even if the romance itself is somewhat predictable, and we liked it very much. We particularly liked Stanley’s aunt Vanessa (Eileen Atkins) who played a small but significant part in the story. 

Recommended.  The rating is 12 (PG-13 in the US) which surprised me as there’s almost no bad language, no nudity or anything explicit, no violence or gore, and nothing scary. Not that it’s the kind of film that would be of any interest to children, or even younger teenagers. But apparently the rating is because there’s quite a bit of smoking shown - and that’s not inappropriate to the 1920s. 

There’s one quite interesting documentary-style ‘extra’ on our blu-ray which we watched. It featured three of the actors talking about the making of the film. There’s also a theatrical trailer, but we didn’t watch that. 

Review copyright 2026 Sue's DVD Reviews