Houdini on History Channel, Adrien Brody mini-series

Anyone here watching this 2-parter? I saw a preview for it several days ago, thinking it was a theatrical film so was surprised to find out it is airing on History Channel. I've got the premiere on my DVR, recording the second episode tonight. Any good?

 

IMHO was good, not great. The special effects were a bit contrived. Part two tonight. And if anyone wants to see how he did his "magic" here you go. Sort of reminds me of Hedley Lamar at the end of Blazing Saddles (regarding Lon Chaney) "how did he do such great stunts with such little feet?".

 

Watched about 10 minutes, then tuned out. Nothing special for me.

John K.

 

I think the editing was a little frenetic, but I gotta say that Brody really got in shape for the role. The casting is a little weird, though, because the real Harry Houdini was not nearly this tall. He was a little guy, and he had to work hard to overcome his "dem-dese-dose" accent.

Here's a preview:



I'll say this: they got Houdini's goofy hair pretty close. The magician had an amazing life, and I hope they finally present an accurate depiction of how he actually died. That whole stupid Tony Curtis movie screwed up the story for years...

 

Sadly, they didn't. Yes, he was punched in the stomach when he wasn't ready for it, but the movie presents it in a very violent and inaccurate way.

 

And he certainly didn't die on stage in the Chinese Water Torture illusion. By this point in his life (52), Houdini was not doing stunts quite that dangerous.

 

The modern score was a deal
breaker , deleted

 

I was surprised there was no thread on here this weekend when I looked. I was looking forward to this mini-series. After watching it I thought it was good, not great. Houdini's always been a fascinating man to me, like many other of the giants of his era. The casting/acting/directing choices I can live with whether or not they were historically 100% accurate I don't really care all that much. I just thought the way it was put together I lost interest a little in part 2. I give this one a B-.

 

It was interesting if you like magic and Houdini, though it felt like a program aimed at a very casual audience.

 

I liked it and it was fun watching but a straight-up docu (Teller, you listening?) would be much better.

 

Most definitely. I liked it well enough for what was, but then again I was one of those casual viewers.

Apparently some not-quite-so causal viewers were less than impressed, especially with the liberties taken with the facts:

http://www.wildabouthoudini.com/2014/09/fact-checking-historys-houdini-night-one.html

http://www.wildabouthoudini.com/2014/09/fact-checking-historys-houdini-night-two.html

http://www.wildabouthoudini.com/2014/09/review-history-gets-c-in-houdini.html

 

It may be a silly point, but late in the second half, Harry was talking about the phony medium, Margary, to his wife on the phone. He described her as "busted". A minor point but that colloquialism was not a 1920s expression. Much more like 1970s. There were several others as well. Generally a disappointment in my opinion.

 

I've read only one book about Houdini and only watched Part 1. As the episode progressed, I kept thinking "I don't remember reading that in the book." Turns out they took some liberties in spinning the yarn.
Not quite as riveting as The Mystery of Al Capone's vault.

 

I was a bit of a Houdini freak as a young boy, inspired by that Tony Curtis movie. Yes, I now know it was wretched, but what did I know at 7?

So perhaps I was expecting too much, but I found this recent series disappointing, gratuitous, even campy at times. It could have been much better.

And yeah, the way he died was not accurate. As I recall from the biographies I read as a boy, Houdini was well-known to be able to take a punch to the stomach, but he had to know it was coming so he could tense his stomach muscles. A boy walked up to him out of a crowd and surprised him with a punch to the stomach. It wasn't malicious at all.

One of the reasons you will probably never see a Penn & Teller documentary/expose, is that P&T more or less observe the magician's unwritten code of conduct to never divulge a trick. Even on their "Fool Penn & Teller" show, they never outright divulge when a fellow magician does not fool them. At best they ask something like, "If you held your hands out like this, could you do that trick exactly as you just did it?" At that point the magician admits to being busted but a non-magician like myself still doesn't know how the trick was actually done. Oh, and I believe Teller still performs a couple of Houdini tricks... the swallowed pins on thread thing for one.