On YouTube there's a video of magician Criss Angel taking the old "sawing a woman in half" trick a step further. He actually pulls a woman in half, whereupon her upper half crawls away in horror while her legs remain behind wriggling. I, like many other people, have been trying to figure out how he does this trick. All I can conclude is that it's achieved by clever editing of the camera footage. (Which, if true, would make it less a magic trick than a special effect, but entertaining nonetheless.) My reasoning is that the (half of a) woman who crawls away at the end is probably not fake. She's likely a woman who, in real life, has no legs. But this cannot be the same woman who initially walks to the table and lies down on it. (No, I don't think she was using robotic legs, or anything like that.) They are two different women. Which means that at some point the camera must have been turned off, and the one woman replaced the other on the table. This also suggests that everyone in the crowd were actors. That's my theory. But I'm actually hoping it's wrong, because it would be cool if he could have done this without turning the camera off at some point. (Thanks to Captain DaFt for the link.) (And I could have sworn I once posted about another Criss Angel trick in which he crawled through a glass window pane, but for the life of me I can't find the post about this.)
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Like I said, he has a knack for making you see only what he wants you to. That's the beauty of magic.
If he does it the same way then the top half is infact a legless women.
The bottom half is a midget.
The midget holds the women when they walk up and then lets go when Criss tells the ladies to pull.
There yah go.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNRXiN-JzWs
its obviously 2 different persons.
look again and tell me...
This video has been removed due to terms of use violation.
There's a horrible trick angel does that's poorly done. where he puts his hand through a guys chest starting from the back. it's obvious that angel puts his arm in between the guys arm and hip which are hidden under the jacket. which has the empty sleeve tugged into the jackets pocket.
No different from Copperfield making the Statue of Liberty disappear in front of "an actual live audience" (bullshit - just actors). David Blane levitating while "unsuspecting people" on the street gawk in amazment (bullshit - just actors). Same with Chris Angel -- yet tv viewers still don't seem to get it. Amazing. That's the REAL mystery...how people can be fooled by tv special fx and actors. Truly amazing.
If you watch the first half the clip is shot from the back side of the bench and when the girl in Red lays down you can see the a camera man on the front side of the bench dressed in Black Shirt and Blue Jeans. After the second lady lays down, when Chris walks around to the back side of the bench, the camera angle switches to the camera man on the front side of the bench and you can now see the second camera man on the back side of the bench wearing a white t-shirt and dark pants.
For this to be a truly unedited clip it would have to be shot all from one camera in one continous take. What ever else is done (switching women, involving the crowd) one thing is 100% fact and that this film was cut and spliced together at least once!
Think about it.
He did do it woth out truing off the camere sjut had one strong midgit and one willing womnen wih no legs. See,Therre is a midget and a woden magne thing or sumthing that holds the girl on top to the wood board. So when hes taping u can hear like hes hitting wood or sumthing then when they pull she runs. The pulleed person is a real perosn with no legs.I forget her name, i think its like rose buts hes on a apge that shows ppl with diseases and disorerds and stuff and thats how they dio it!
I always say "There's nothing to it, they're just playing tricks on us, everything can be explained" - but I didn't have any explanation. I'm glad there ARE several ones, so thanks a lot, folks 😉.
He's entertaining and has inspired ideas - enough said.
Also, the blonde woman is clearly a "plant" (and a terrible actress!)
Cheers!
2) Two people who are both very short / midgets
3) The crowd was not acting, they really didn't know.
4) The lady sitting on top of the "legs" lady was sitting on her shoulders. Notice the big skirt.
5) Notice the legs sit up. Legs don't sit up in this fashion, joints don't allow it. It's obvious someone very small is hiding under the skirt.
Simple.
Way back in mid 20th century, when the "sawing a woman in half" trick was at peak popularity, a magician (I can't recall the name just now) performed a variation using the Eck brothers. In the trick Johnny (who had been born without a lower half to his body) would sit on top of his brother's shoulders, and a costume was worn that hid this. During the performance of the "sawing" it was a simple matter of detaching the costume, and once the saw had "cut the man in half" Johnny would suddenly yell out and make his way off the stage on his hands, while his brother Robert, as the "legs" would go running up and down the aisle of the theater "looking for their top half"!
Pandemonium would break out in the theater, as people would screem, and jump away from the legs, and the "upper half" kept yelling for the legs to come back!
All in all, it has been said, this particular presentation of the sawing trick was the best ever. And because of Criss Angel's reproduction of the trick, you can see why.
I must credit "The Amazing Randi" for this information. A fine magician and skeptic.
I have seen Copperfield perform this same trick but he was getting cut in half himself. I saw this live in Montreal, CANADA and I still haven't figured it out.
Copperfield is chained to a table and this huge rotating saw blade comes down on him and cuts him in half. There are no boxes around him, nothing covering under the table (you can see right under)or on top of him. You basically see him get cut in half right in front of you, so there's no camera tricks...
Like I said, I'm still mind boggled...
If your body was pulled in half...would you crawl away like that with that much ease? you are crawling on hands for the first time afterall 😛, besides i think i'd just sit there and yell my throat out!