about The Illusionist

I dismissed the flashback solution the inspector was thinking at the train station as wishful thinking for a man he did truly admire.

I had a hard time believing, when he finally did his second investigation of the stall, that it was the inspector's first inkling that the prince could be so corrupt -- there was a look on his face, not so obvious as the look at the station -- of sudden recognition/an overthrow of his previously-held view of the prince. At one point Eisenheim asks the inspector, "Are you totally corrupt?" and the look on the inspector's face seems to indicate no knowledge of the accusations that have been made against Leopold over time.

Actually, I had a hard time believing the inspector would have any business walking out the front gate of the presumed palace (where he was handed the folio on the Orange Tree trick) in business attire after the prince's suicide; I didn't think his career would survive his change of mind. Giamatti's inspector had a guileless demeanor unlikely for an inspector, yet he wasn't bumbling; he was kind of an anti-Clouseau, or, a reverse Clouseau.
I liked the themes of power, the follies of challenging power with nothing to gain but exposure of the truth, AND of blindly going along, the endurance of love.