This is a review for James' new lecture DVD, as detailed in this thread:
http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic24547.php
So, let's rock and roll...
Difficulty: 2-4 (Simple to difficult sleights, nothing outrageous)
A lot of James' stuff uses sleights like the side steal and the such, but most of the controls/peeks/whatever used in this DVD could be replaced with something you prefer using. There are a few things that are gonna take time to learn (the muscle pass being one, and some serious culling action being another...) but generally the material is far more about the way you present the trick, ie. James' uber-confident, balls of steel, under-their-nose approach.
Production values: 4/10
I thought I'd get this out of the way now. This is a lecture, which has been recorded and put onto DVD. That is it. The DVD box is white with black lettering, and a list of effects. There is no interactive menu, there are no chapters, there is no wordart telling you what the next trick is. It is 2 hours of footage, and little else. Personally I like this, because that means it's all about the magic rather than some ridiculous Ellusionist style DVD that is essentially a feature length montage of flourishes and audience reactions that only teaches you the pass. However, the lack of menus means you can't just skip straight to the trick you want, you have to bounce around for it, and that is a bit of a pain in the a**e.
Teaching: 7/10
James teaches the stuff very well, although often hurriedly. A lot of the effects are building on those that were in Still Fancy A Pot Of Jam, and so if you've seen that you won't mind him very quickly skimming over how to do a certain card control or whatever. He's obviously thought about what he's doing and so each trick is taught by focusing on the really important aspects, things like misdirection, attitude, controlling the audience etc. His speech about what to do when someone catches you out is very good, and totally spot on.
Material: 7/10
I'm still somewhat in two minds about this. A lot of the effects are, I imagine, very strong. However, as all the effects are performed on an audience of magicians, the responses are (at best) knowing smiles and ripples of applause. It's not that they're not impressive, magicians just don't react like laypeople. Pot of Jam was nicely interspersed with footage of James performing for members of the public, which made it very easy to see how effective some of the tricks were. In the lecture one of the strongest effects (Underhanded) isn't really performed at all as the audience has pretty much just been shown the working for it. There's some really nice stuff here, and some that I personally am not such a fan of, but that I am sure is still very powerful if performed well.
Overall: 7/10
If you've not got anything by James Brown, buy Still Fancy a Pot of Jam? because it's bloody brilliant. If you've got SFAPOJ and you really liked it, get this. He builds on a lot of the tricks and principles and takes things a lot further in some cases. If you own SFAPOJ and you enjoyed it, but never really got used to James' style of magic, or never really got round to performing any of the tricks on it, then you may want to give this a miss.
I like James' magical style a lot, and there's some stuff here that I'm definitely going to work into my professional close up routine, but I can't help but feel this DVD is more of a follow up to SFAPOJ than it is a stand-alone piece.