Anthony Hopkins as a schizophrenic magician and Ann-Margret the woman he loves
A shy man finds success as a ventriloquist with his dummy “Fats,” but vacations in his hometown in the Catskills where he seeks to reunite with a high school friend. As his agent tries to find him, the woman's hubby might show up. Burgess Meredith and Ed Lauter play the latter two.
“Magic” (1978) is a slow burn Hitchcock-ian psychological drama/thriller that mixes bits of "Psycho" with the creepy mannequins of several 70's movies/shows, like Kolchak: The Night Stalker's "The Trevi Collection." The well-done "Pin" from a decade later was influenced by it. It’s basically a lowkey cabin-in-the-woods flick with the unique dummy angle.
While not great like “Psycho” or even “Carrie,” it’s cut from the same cloth in its unique way with toned-down horror. I respect a movie that has the confidence to take its time and is frugal about thrills. It makes it more realistic. Meanwhile the quiet rural locations are great and it’s interesting seeing Hopkins when he was young and relatively unknown. He was 40 during shooting while Ann-Margret was a couple months shy of 37.
The film runs 1 hour, 47 minutes, and was shot at Blue Lakes in Northern California (substituting for the Catskills), which is a two-hour drive north of San Francisco/Oakland. Other scenes were done at nearby Ukiah (Corky’s childhood home) and Twentieth Century-Fox Studios in Los Angeles, as well as Manhattan.
GRADE: B