THE EFFECT:

Following a brief introduction along these lines, you display a collection of

around a
dozen postcards representing the publicity posters from various classic films
(Citizen
Kane, Vertigo, Carry On Camping). Ask your participant to imagine that she is
standing outside a glorious neon-lit multiplex cinema, surrounded by such posters
as
these. Have her visualise the scene as vividly as she can: see the queues of eager
cinema-goers; smell the overpriced hot dogs; chisel the bits of fusty popcorn out
of
her dentures with a toothpick crudely fashioned from a rolled-up ticket-stub.
Ask her to imagine that she is looking at the various movie posters on display at
the
cinema (indicating the postcards). "In a moment, you will select a film to watch
tonight, although you may not realise why you have chosen that particular movie."
Tell her you want her to mentally focus on one poster after another at random,
changing her mind a few times. After a few seconds, you will click your fingers and
have her 'Stop!' with one particular film clear in her mind. "Whichever poster you
are
focussing on at this precise moment, stay with that choice."
Let's say she chooses 'Vertigo'.
Gather up the postcards and display a few of them, casually, one at a time, as you
remind everyone that she could have chosen to see any one of these ten or twelve
films, each a classic of its day, but that 'something' influenced her to see
Vertigo.
What is particularly interesting is that, when you turn each of the movie poster-
cards
over one by one, all the backs are completely blank, except the chosen 'Vertigo'
card, which bears the following handwritten message:
- "Our preliminary research into the effects of subliminal imagery suggests that
this new poster design for the movie 'Vertigo' should do the business nicely....
signed Dr Osiris B. Crippen, Dept of Psychology, Katatonic University" (or
words to that effect).
THE METHOD:
There are, in fact, not 12 postcards, but 24, each showing a different film poster
design. You can buy film postcards from memorabilia shops, some cinemas, and
places such as the NMPFT (National Museum of Photography, Film & Television).
However, an alternative might be to mock them up yourself on a PC & Printer using
self-printable blank postcards which are readily available from stationers. I'll
leave it
up to your imagination where to find the images, although the words 'online' and
'video inserts' spring to mind. Bear in mind that if you adopt the latter DIY
approach,
I expect you to do the decent thing and contact all the original directors and cast
members (especially the dead ones) to arrange royalty payments, because it goes
without saying that CT does not condone copyright infringement in any form.
Each of the 12 postcards which you display has a second card attached to its 'back'
with 3M Spraymount (or a similar non-permanent adhesive which allows easy
repositioning), so that they form a pair not unlike the rough-smooth pairings in an
invisible deck. Unlike the rough-smooth deck, however, the Spraymount adhesive
means that the individual pairs can be held up one at a time (appearing to be a
single card), or subtly parted and displayed as separate items on a table top. (If
we
were to use roughing fluid, then the cards would have to be 'fanned' in order to
keep
the cards paired up, which is fine for playing cards, but inappropriate for our
6
purposes, as it would look highly suspicious, and would not allow the designs to be
seen in their entirety. Again, with playing cards there is no need to see the
entire
face of a card, as you only need to see the corner indices in order to identify
them).
Let's call the 'front' card of each pair 'A', and the card affixed to its back 'B'.
In the
case of each pairing, the reverse of card 'A' bears the message from the
psychologist (with the name of the appropriate film inserted), whilst the rear of
card
'B' is blank. Thus, when the two cards are paired up evenly (firmly affixed with
Spraymount) and displayed, they appear as a single blank-backed movie postcard.
The 'secret' should be apparent to you by now.
The unseen rear card of each pair (card B) should feature a different film, but of
a
similar style and genre to the others, so that when it later becomes visible, it
will not
immediately 'stand out' from the rest. (If you've got films like Psycho, Vertigo,
North
By Northwest etc, don't have them backed with 'Toy Story 2' or 'Nuns in Jelly').
After scene-setting, you display the twelve movie postcards (the 'A's, with one of
the
'B's invisibly secreted behind each).
At the appropriate moment, when your volunteer has settled on her chosen image,
you gather up all of the poster-cards, and in the process of displaying a few of
them,
subtly separate the relevant card (A) from its backing (B). It will take a little
experimentation to get the hang of this, and the key is partly in the amount of
Spraymount adhesive you have used to join the two cards. You need enough to hold
the cards together securely, but not so much that they stick too firmly or make a
'sucking' noise as you part them. (But that's obvious).
Try not to draw attention to the 'spare' card which you have separated from the
back
of the target card, but don't go out of your way to hide it either. The fact that
it is of a
similar style and genre to the others means that it should not stand out if it is
partly
glimpsed by the audience, so long as you don't wave it under their noses, and noone
will notice that there are now 13 cards in play rather than 12. This is one reason
we're not using just 5 or 6 cards. With smaller quantities, people will spot an
extra
one, but once you get over 9 or 10, it should go unnoticed.
It's now just a matter of displaying a few of the non-target cards face down so the
onlookers can see they are all blank, with the exception of the target card, which
can
now be shown to have the message from Dr Osiris B. Crippen on the back.
� 2003