Precognition

THE BLURB:
"The roots of this idea go back 400 years -- but Martin
Lewis has yanked it into the 21st century. It was worth the
wait."-Max Maven

Precognition: Clairvoyance relating to an event or state not
yet experienced. In this case to foretell a video event
before it occurs.

A spectator chooses one of six disks and places it into a
DVD player. They then choose an episode on that disk, then a
chapter from that episode. Before they hit the play button
you describe a scene in detail. They then play their
selection and it matches your description perfectly.

The disks can be checked both before and after, all the
episodes and chapters are different.

The effect plays in almost any venue, from a TV set in a
living room to a full size auditorium. If the theater has
multimedia capabilities the effect plays huge.

NOTE: This product is compatible with most DVD players,
however there may be some off brand, or older machines, with
which it is not compatible. Please check first.

MY COMMENTS:
If you're looking for an effect involving predicting a
specific scene from a group of DVDs, then this certainly
demands your consideration. Obviously, you'll need a DVD
player. A notebook computer works well and Martin Lewis
also suggests an inexpensive portable DVD player. Larger
venues can use a projector system.

What's not in the blurb is that you get a set of six DVDs
filled with episodes of the 60s/70s TV Western show Bonanza
about the fictional Cartwright family starring Lorne Greene
and Michael Landon. Why Bonanza? Martin provides three
reasons. First, the disc looks like a cheap set of discs
that are available in discount DVD bins (well, let's face
it, they are a cheap set of discs as I'll mention again
below). Second, most people are familiar with Bonanza, but
not intimately familiar with the 400+ episodes of the
series. Third, these episodes are in the public domain so
you can legally and freely use them in your act.

The principle here, as Max's testimonial informs, is quite
old, but still being used today in booktests and various
other routines. This is the first time that I've seen it
applied to DVDs. There is a very clever use of music that
makes it very easy to make certain that everything's going
right. In fact, I can't help thinking that Martin may have
taken that idea further so that this routine can be
repeatable. As it is, it's really not repeatable, and
experienced mentalists could probably correctly guess why.
For that reason, I certainly don't recommend this as a
walkaround item, nor do I recommend using it if your
audiences tend to be repeat audiences.

Other than these considerations, you get six discs in a
large DVD clamshell case that holds them all. The quality
of the videos is very similar to that of the discount bin
DVDs, meaning the quality is serviceable but not HD. The
cover art for Precognition can be flipped over so that you
have the cover art for the Essential Bonanza set. The
instructions are printed on a single, folded-page insert.
This is certainly an easy-to-do effect and if you're
interested in this, then it certainly delivers what it
promises and is recommended.