talkmagic.co.uk

13 Steps to Mentalism – DVD with Richard Osterlind
£89.99 from Alakazam and other retailers

What They Say
12 HOURS OF CLASSIC MENTALISM - PERFORMANCE - EXPLANATION - DISCUSSION

Tony Corinda's landmark work, 13 Steps To Mentalism, is widely considered to be the mentalist's bible. In this comprehensive DVD series, modern-day master Richard Osterlind performs dynamic effects from each step of Corinda's seminal work in front of a live audience. Then, along with co-host Jim Sisti, digs deep into the principles and concepts that make this material so strong and timeless. This DVD set ably demonstrates why Corinda's 13 Steps To Mentalism will always be a fundamental and substantial part of any mentalist's education.

Total Running Time: Approximately 12hrs

Review
OK, having had this mammoth set for the best part of a week now, I am only now emerging, blinking back into daylight having trawled through the set and survived!

It’s fair to say that the announcement of this set caused a bit of a stir on the boards with comments questioning the merit (or indeed the point!) of making a DVD based around Corinda’s classic text. Well I’m pleased to report that our fears were entirely unfounded and Richard Osterlind has created a wonderful companion to a book that is very dear to all mentalist’s hearts.

I’m not going to go through every disc in detail as I’m going to assume that the majority of us will be familiar with the book – and if you’re not, then you should be! You will get the most out of this DVD set by first reading the book and then using Osterlind’s fantastic demonstrations to further enhance your understanding.

Having said that, I suppose it would be possible to buy this DVD set without having read the book and still get a lot of use out of it -but my personal preference is to have the book on hand as an invaluable reference tool… Especially when you consider that A LOT of the routines in the book are NOT contained on the DVD set (Even 12 hours wouldn’t be long enough for that!!!)

The format of each disc is fairly standard – Osterlind introduces each section and then performs a number of routines from that section, each followed by an in-depth discussion with Jim Sisti. It’s these discussions that prove to be the most valuable facet of this DVD set. Osterlind has a wonderful teaching technique and he throws some fantastically valuable nuggets of additional information into the mix as well. It’s clear he loves the original text and has spent years performing his act based upon the techniques contained therein. He mentions the parts that have (and haven’t!) worked so well for him over the years and also explains any subtle changes he may have made to Corinda’s original methods.

The production of the discs are faultless – the menu systems are wonderfully designed to allow you to navigate to exactly the section you want without needing to scroll through multiple pages. Oh – and as it’s a L&L production, you can expect some familiar faces in the audience (Big Up FRANK!!!).

All in all, a great product that enhances an already classic book. It made me revisit some old routines contained in the book and add them back into my repertoire my upcoming shows!

Thanks for the review, Klangster.

I'd love to watch this - 13 Steps is pretty much the definition of 'a classic text' and I really enjoy watching Osterlind perform and discuss his thoughts - but, well, y'know... ninety quid. There's no way I'll ever be able to cajole myself into shelling out ninety quid to watch (however well and however engagingly and with whatever extra thoughts) demonstrations of things I already have laid out for me in the book.

I have been waiting two weeks to get this DVD, yet Hocus Pocus is being a bunch of asses and keeps telling me different stories on weather they have it in stock or not. Hopefully they will get it in stock and ship it first day to me by next week.

I can see this being a useful accompaniment to the book for someone like me who can sometimes find the heavy text descriptions a little tricky to follow if not in the right frame of mind. At £90 though I'm not sure. It breaks down to £7.50 an hour of tuition which is very good value when you look at it like that but is £90 too much to pay? On the most part I think yes.

This point of mine can easily be proved to be worthless, but part of me thinks that the greatest Mentalists we've seen have often been schooled by the original texts and they have clearly done well.
One of the brilliant things about PMM and 13 Steps are the fact that you take the description and effect in a personal way. Much like when you read a book and get your own idea of the characters how everything looks.
It is unique to you, nice and original.
The dvd set, whilst probably terrifically useful, reminds me of the film rendition that comes out of the book you read, and none of the characters look like anything you had imagined. You now have the same school of thought and aesthetic visions as everybody who has seen the film. When you go back to reading the book, you can only imagine the film characters playing the parts that you had originally imagined!

Personally, unless you really struggle with the descriptions and ideas presented solely because of the way their written, then the dvd set is an excuse to not study the original texts properly.

If you couldn't succeed with the book, I think it's unlikely a dvd rendition will convert you into a decent mentalist.

I'd recommened having a listen to one of the Magic Newswire Podcasts - a recent one included an hour long interview with Osterlind and he talks about his reasons behind producing this set (amongst other things!).

I somewhat agree with Lenoir - however, it should be stressed that the book was written a long time ago and some of the language may be offputting to some. I think the DVD is a great accompaniment to the book - if only to see some of the theories put into practice. There's also some stuff on the DVD that is just barely covered in the book (sometimes only a single paragraph!) that absolutley flies during Osterlind's performance - I found myself thinking "that's not in the book!" and rushing back to my copy, only to find that it is, indeed, in there!

Horses for Courses I guess - and, let's face it, this release was always going to cause some controversy amongst us, wasn't it?




Sean

It's a great DVD set and really I think it's good that Osterlind left some things out. Due to the fact that SOME of the things in the book are pretty much impossible to pull of now days (Whispering Buddha and the other Lip reading effects as well.) Not that I don't think you can't read people's lips. Just that with the whispering one, pretty much 100% of everybody covers their mouths when whispering anything to anybody.

Sexton Blake wrote:Thanks for the review, Klangster.

I'd love to watch this - 13 Steps is pretty much the definition of 'a classic text' and I really enjoy watching Osterlind perform and discuss his thoughts - but, well, y'know... ninety quid. There's no way I'll ever be able to cajole myself into shelling out ninety quid to watch (however well and however engagingly and with whatever extra thoughts) demonstrations of things I already have laid out for me in the book.

Same. Plus, L&L audiences make me feel physically sick.

madvillainy wrote:

Sexton Blake wrote:Thanks for the review, Klangster.

I'd love to watch this - 13 Steps is pretty much the definition of 'a classic text' and I really enjoy watching Osterlind perform and discuss his thoughts - but, well, y'know... ninety quid. There's no way I'll ever be able to cajole myself into shelling out ninety quid to watch (however well and however engagingly and with whatever extra thoughts) demonstrations of things I already have laid out for me in the book.

Same. Plus, L&L audiences make me feel physically sick.

The L&L crowd is OK, they are regular people, it just gets annoying seeing the same dude in every DVD. Which is why I often enjoy the Alakazam stuff a lot more. No studio audience and c*** (not the best). I think Osterlind pointed out how when doing the 13 steps stuff for the audience, a few of them kept trying to figure things out. Not in a bad way, but in a more curious way.

So essentially if you feel frivolous the DVD set is a very good 'accompaniment' to the book but in no way a short cut. Would that be fair to say then?

A perfect summary

Randy wrote:

madvillainy wrote:

Sexton Blake wrote:Thanks for the review, Klangster.

I'd love to watch this - 13 Steps is pretty much the definition of 'a classic text' and I really enjoy watching Osterlind perform and discuss his thoughts - but, well, y'know... ninety quid. There's no way I'll ever be able to cajole myself into shelling out ninety quid to watch (however well and however engagingly and with whatever extra thoughts) demonstrations of things I already have laid out for me in the book.

Same. Plus, L&L audiences make me feel physically sick.

The L&L crowd is OK, they are regular people, it just gets annoying seeing the same dude in every DVD. Which is why I often enjoy the Alakazam stuff a lot more. No studio audience and c*** (not the best). I think Osterlind pointed out how when doing the 13 steps stuff for the audience, a few of them kept trying to figure things out. Not in a bad way, but in a more curious way.

There are actually two dudes who are good friends with Louis Falanga

One is Scotty, who looks like Shaggy in the Scooby Doo Cartoons. I've been seeing him on every L&L DVD since early 2000. One is Frank, the huge African American with glasses. He took place of another guy in the old L&L videos.

Does he teach improved methods that bring it into the 21st century, eg The day for any date system?

Yeah updates a few methods here and there.

IAIN wrote:y'know what im dreading?...

some half-baked production company trying to make it into a dvd-set and spoiling it completely...

thats the day i buy a gun and hunt someone down...