The Magician

Imagine if, somehow, you could make a documentary about a hitman where you followed his life as he got amongst it. That's The Magician. It's funny, uncomfortably tense and very wrong (but funny!) Ray (Scott Ryan), a Melbourne 'magician' who makes people disappear, has his everyday life documented by his neighbour, Max (Massimiliano Andrighetto). The whole film crosscuts between several subplots involving Ray and Max's misadventures in an inner-city suburbia populated by petty criminals and junkies, whilst Ray narrates the sordid and mundane realities of his life.

For once, it's nice to see a handheld digicam being used to make something other than low budget horror. The cut-and-run manner of filming also means we get to see parts of Australian cities that we don't normally see in the movies. Ray himself (played by the film's writer-director) is a dangerous and larriken-ish figure - a unique voice that gives the film a lot of its colour and also accounts for its genuinely unpredictable nature. It's like Chopper to the Nth degree.

Max tries to treat Ray like a normal person who can be reasoned with (EG. The scene where Ray calls upon a guy who stole Max's stuff, or when Max tries to convince Ray to let a mark sit in the backseat of his car after the mark pisses himself) but Ray is an unknowable commodity, and this is what drives the film. The unsettling but engaging atmosphere is further enforced by the way The Magician juxtaposes a casual, jokey manner with a deadly serious subject matter - tackling pertinent questions such as "how much will it take to eat a bowl of shit" and "will you go to the gay mardis gras?" It's laught-out-loud stuff, easily up there as an Australian crime-comedy classic alongside Idiot Box, Two Hands and Chopper.

DIRECTOR: Scott Ryan
WRITER/SOURCE: Scott Ryan, based on another film by Scott Ryan.
KEY ACTORS: Scott Ryan, Massimiliano Andrighetto, Ben Walker, Kane Mason, Nathaniel Lindsay.

RELATED TEXTS:
- Ryan was initially influenced by the memoir of a New York hitman called Contract Killer.
- This is actually the second version of this film. Scott Ryan had already made The Magician and cut it down to 30 minutes so that he could enter it into a short film competition. The film found its way to Nash Edgerton, who Ryan coaxed on board as a producer. This prompted a complete re-shooting of the film with slightly higher production values, resulting in the released version. Some parts of the original version can be seen on the DVD release as an extra.
- Unfortunately Scott Ryan is yet to appear in or make another film. Back in 2005 when The Magician was released, he spoke in interviews about a follow-up project titled Who Cares Who Knows, purportedly a 'realistic' zombie film. Unfortunately, it never materialised.
- For more Aussie crime stuff see Chopper, Two Hands, Animal Kingdom, Gettin' Square, Dirty Deeds, Idiot Box, Snowtown, The Square and The Hard Word.