The Magic of Mindfreak

June 5, 2006

Mindfreak [logo]Has any­one ever seen Criss Angel’s A&E series Mindfreak?:“Mindfreak(Official web site for show)”:http://www.crissangel.com/?

It seems like most of his “magic” is staged, espe­cially in cer­tain sit­u­a­tions where the illu­sion seems out of ordi­nary — in some cases sur­real — and yet the skep­tic in me assumes he’s using clever cam­era angles and audi­ence plants.

Case in point, in one par­tic­u­lar trick he asks a woman to write the name of an ani­mal on a slip of paper. He then takes the paper, glances at it notic­ing she wrote “but­ter­fly”, folds the piece of paper and mag­i­cally — out of thin air — sum­mons a real butterfly.

In my opin­ion, the aver­age per­son would prob­a­bly choose some­thing with a bit more flare, like Griz­zly Bear or Bad­ger (and yes, UHF comes to mind) and not some­thing so sim­ple. Which again leads to me to believe that the major­ity of tricks per­formed on cam­era are con­trived to the point where magic isn’t just slight of hand any­more, it’s purely act­ing and mak­ing sure the per­for­mance itself plays out in a con­vinc­ing manner.

What are your thoughts?
 

28 comments

I totally agree. Planted mate­r­ial / sleight of hand is all it seems to be.
At first it’s easy to get wrapped up in it, but then it just seems silly.

by Anton on June 5, 2006 at 1:49 pm. Reply #

Lol…It’s funny that you brought that up. When I saw the com­mer­cial for his show, I was like “No, way”. I haven’t nec­es­sar­ily seen the show but I have caught up with some of his “magic” on YouTube here.

by Jorgeq on June 5, 2006 at 8:45 pm. Reply #

I had never heard about it until a few days ago when i watched the sea­son 2 pre­mière. In which he lev­i­tates from one top of a build­ing to another. Eh, what the hell?.

There is just no way this is real, and after all it is called mind freak. Illu­sions, but i just can’t fig­ure out how he pulls the illu­sions off.

by josue salazar on June 6, 2006 at 5:50 am. Reply #

Anton: Unless, as I men­tioned, the magi­cian is able to mag­i­cally bring a three-winged dragon in front of my eyes or at the very least a bad­ger, then I’m going to stay on my side of the fence. Card tricks are one thing, mak­ing ani­mals appear out of thin air is another.

Jorgeq: I’ve watched a few of those on Youtube as well. Speak­ing of which, that site has become quite the resource for videos, user­made and sub­mit­ted. Quite remark­able if you ask me.

by kartooner on June 6, 2006 at 11:42 am. Reply #

I had seen a few episodes a while back and really enjoyed it. Ear­lier this week he was doing an inter­view with The Mon­sters, morn­ing radio sta­tion here in Orlando, and said that some of it is real while some is com­pletely fabricated.

It is a very inter­est­ing show either way. Much more con­vinc­ing than Blane or other “street” magicians.

by Mark Michon on June 9, 2006 at 11:05 am. Reply #

well it is sorta redicu­lous that you would say any­thing when of course they are just illus­tions.. the man even says him­self that he is just trik­ing the human mind. he is very good at per­form­ing stunts he doesnt try to make believ­ers of “magic” or any­thing he is prob­a­bly the least super sti­touse per­son alive. he finds joy in try­ing to fool peo­ple which is per­fectly fine and enjoy­able. when does he ever say there is actu­ally a thing as magic?

by paige on June 21, 2006 at 11:29 pm. Reply #

if he actu­ally said it was all com­pletely fake he wouldnt have any­more fans!

by paige on June 21, 2006 at 11:30 pm. Reply #

Paige: Your opin­ion is appre­ci­ated, Paige, how­ever com­ing from some­one who was obses­sively involved with magic as a kid, I under­stand it’s purely effec­tive illu­sion and sleight of hand. What I was refer­ring to mainly is what is known as “cam­era magic”, wherein some of the effects can be fur­ther pol­ished in post production.

That’s one of the advan­tages of film­ing these tricks on cam­era and hav­ing a par­tic­u­lar episode air weeks later.

Just an obser­va­tion, but of course it’s enter­tain­ing nonetheless.

by kartooner on June 22, 2006 at 12:08 am. Reply #

there was a few cool tricks he did such as the on where he went through the wood­chip­per but he didint actu­ally go through the chip­per it was a hologram

by michelle on June 22, 2006 at 9:58 pm. Reply #

This show comes in at like 2 in the morn­ing in the UK, and it’s always a hilar­i­ous view­ing — I love how he aspires to be part rock god, part magi­cian. The whole thing is just so incred­i­bly ridicu­lous, it makes for great telly.

by danae on June 23, 2006 at 7:47 am. Reply #

i just saw a video on a web­site where he went through glass im pretty sure it was fake

by blank on July 19, 2006 at 7:24 pm. Reply #

peo­ple, he is an enter­tainer, his job is to enter­tain you, i think he is cool, even if it is staged, which i do not totally believe, he keeps me watch­ing his show. plus why dont you fig­ure out how to do his stunts like… burned alive, buried alive, suv nail bed, easy rider, in two, walk on water. unless u can do this stuff shut up. ok

by Anonomous on July 29, 2006 at 10:04 pm. Reply #

Criss Angel is a deity. He is a mini-god. His hum­ble atti­tude towards his real abil­ity keeps us think­ing that he is really try­ing hard to per­form the feats he does. In real­ity he’s just toy­ing with us to increase rat­ings for his show. That answers a big ques­tion I’ve had about “God”. All he wants is money.

by Young and Stupid on August 5, 2006 at 3:23 am. Reply #

Well said, Anonomous.

It’s like wrestling. Fans (I hope) know it’s fake, but it’s still some­what enter­tain­ing to watch. You know it’s fake, but still, how did they fall off of a lad­der with no injuries? Mind Freak is just the more mag­i­cal alternative.

by Devlin Palmer on August 5, 2006 at 6:35 pm. Reply #

how come every­time he makes somthin dis­a­pear he never makess it reapear

by joe on August 23, 2006 at 6:01 pm. Reply #

HEy criss angle

I really what to see you in real live i want you to do somet­ing crazy for me if you can and i want to be seen on your show please I love your show i see it every time tha tis on TV. i like this girl her name is sofia and she is a girl how goes to karate and i go there to and i kinda like her and i just cant wait to see u tha tu will do some­thing crazy on me.

MY name is Vasiliy Lev­ant­sevych i’m russ­ian guy but i speak eng­lish and i wha tsome­thing done on me so that sofia can see me on TV and tell her i like her a lot.…

and i want to me the best mas­ter or magic like you are .

You rock MIND FREAK !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My e-mail is Vasiliy_51@hotmail.com

please sent me e-mail please criss one thing at a life time like you all­ways say it on your show.

Please Criss Angle I live at Antibes 80 on bathrust and Antibes.

by vasiliy on August 25, 2006 at 12:29 am. Reply #

vasiliy, I have an odd sense of doubt that Criss Angel doesn’t actively read this website.

That’d rock though.

by Sue Donim on September 9, 2006 at 1:42 pm. Reply #

Dear Mind Freak,
I hope u come to Palm Har­bor Florida. Me and my friend love your show. When she told me about it i said i have to watch it so i did. When i saw your show i was amazed of what you do. But thats what i was hop­ing is if you come so i can see your show and maybe you can show my brother a few tricks. When he saw your show he didn’t belive it he thought it was trick pho­togr­phy. I said no but he wont lis­ten. Please Mind Freak Please Please come to palm har­bor florida i want to make a beliver out of my brother and if u do please lev­i­tate me that would be AWSOME!!! just to let u know im only 12 thank bye.

by Jessica B on September 18, 2006 at 8:46 pm. Reply #

[Com­ment ID #14095 Will Be Quoted Here]
That’s because it wasen’t an illu­sion… trust me it was the real thing

by Kristian on October 28, 2006 at 9:43 am. Reply #

It IS illusion–but heck It is enter­tain­ing as all get out. I cer­tainly would love to see him do one of his per­for­mances live on the street.So he does it to make money–isn’t that what most peo­ple do everyday?He at least amuses peo­ple in the process. Way bet­ter than Siegfried and Roy–whom I saw 2 times in Las Vegas.I like try­ing to fig­ure out how he does his stuff. So what if it is cam­era tricks too?? Like the movies we pay to see aren’t?? Enjoy–that’s what his show is meant for us to do.And–I do–even if it is all illusion/etc. :) Heck I have seen a lot of stuff in my 50 years—-and I enjoy Criss Angel.

by viv on November 4, 2006 at 2:57 pm. Reply #

Well i know that every­one has there opin­ions, but i belive that Criss Angel can really do what he does and if you lis­ten to what he says about tap­ping into the great pow­ers of your mind and body then who knows what our lim­its. I mean thats what Criss Angel is doing, he’s test­ing the pow­ers and lim­its in the world.…Criss Angel also has a good point about us being kids because it is true, when we are kids we do not pos­sess that much knowl­edge and have a great imag­i­na­tion, there­fore we belive in a lot of things and know no lim­its in the world!!! :) YOUR THE BEST CRISS ANGEL

by Christian on November 6, 2006 at 3:07 pm. Reply #

criss angel is truly the biggest MINDFREAK that i have ever seen. im a huge fan of your show and know­ing that you can do all this freaks me right out of my freak­ing skin! what ever peo­ple say i think that are the real freak­ing thing! MINDFREK is all that i can say for now but i cant wait until i can see some more MINDFREAKING!

by jefta obed on November 14, 2006 at 6:58 pm. Reply #

i’m with chris­t­ian on this-i truly believe he has spe­cial pow­ers and can actu­ally do all of what he does-when you all say “illu­sions” and “cam­era tricks”, do you mean that you think he does his show with a fake audi­ence and it’s all fake spe­cial effects?

by fonzbear2000 on June 15, 2007 at 11:45 pm. Reply #

oh yes he pos­sess these pow­ers, 100% mind usage, blah blah. Why don’t he start heal­ing vic­tims of can­cer? or uses his brain to pre­dict next qat­rina or some other nat­ural dis­as­ter? Come ooon … his mother was an assis­tant to some magi­cian. His brother’s an actor. Some peo­ple just love to be fooled. God bless you all.

by saqe on June 29, 2007 at 5:48 am. Reply #

hey criss,i know that you have done the lift­ing up ppl trick but i want to know how to lift my self up do you

.con­sen­trate as hard as you pos­si­b­ley can
.does the spirit of your soul help you
.or does a spirit give you the power

with the last one a spirit gives you power did i spirit came to you when you were a lit­tle kid and it said you can have this power or is it all make bele­vie plz tell me at.….… micky_mt_@hotmail.com

by michael on July 8, 2007 at 1:53 pm. Reply #

Criss is amaz­ing! You guys don’t know what you are talk­ing about. Every­thing he does is real. I’ve talked to him before and he even showed me the truth. He showed me how he got chopped in a wood chop­per. it was real. So for you guys, I’d be scared before you say things like that.

by andriy on July 18, 2007 at 3:27 pm. Reply #

well i believe it it doesn’t show any­thing that leads me not to, i meen really it looks so real to me. i dont know how any one could ques­tion what he can do.….. if you believe its not real than explain it to me because with all do respect you must be an idiot.….….….….….….….….….….….….…..

i my self would love to become a mind freak so if any­one is up for teach­ing me email me please, so does my sis­ter Christina and my brother brandon

ps it is real man it is f**k’n real man

by mando on August 15, 2007 at 12:26 am. Reply #

I hon­estly dont think it is fake…illusions are just that, they’re are tricks of the eye and mind that lead you to believe that it is true…I enjoy it and I’m not going to ana­lyze all of his tricks…I think he is tal­ented and I per­son­ally love watch­ing his show. He needs to lose the beard, though.

by Sarah on August 4, 2008 at 11:53 am. Reply #

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