Spectacular slow card-flourishes from Dimitri Arleri

PeaceLove sez, "My buddy Chris 'Orbit' Brown just hipped me to this lovely video of one Dimitri Arleri doing some amazing card flourishes, set to an unidentified piece of ambient opera. Most flourish videos are rapid-fire montages of jaw-dropping excellence (ie. the brilliant Buck Twins) but this guy slows the pace and goes for a more flowing, elegant style. Magicians are taking note. Watch to the end; it's killer!"

Card Flourishes: Dimitri Arleri - "Opera" www.thecuso.info (Thanks, PeaceLove)

Previously:

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Mastertahj

Ya, that is because those arms have never seen the sun. They were damn near translucent! BUT, you don’t get freaky good at this kind of thing by being concerned with ‘outside’…
- devophill
  
  It’s a video post-production effect.
Brandon West

I like the music a lot, though I’d call it glitchy downtempo. There’s too much going on for it to be ambient.
Anonymous

That song begs to be in “The Fifth Element”
willy359

I dunno. I’m a big fan of playing card sleight of hand, but this kind of thing leaves me cold. To me, the mark of a real expert at the card table is that, even if you know how the techniques work, even if you can do them yourself, even if you’re staring right at the guy’s hands two feet away from you, you still can’t see what he’s doing. A card manipulator should be judged by his second dealing, not by his flourishes. Just my opinion.
- PeaceLove
  
  Actually, card flourishes are sort of a separate but related art to magic. I think what Aleri and others do is more akin to juggling than magic, and as such it can be dramatic, eye popping, or beautiful.
  
  You are correct that a magician should cover his work so it’s invisible. But that doesn’t mean he has to pretend to be incompetent with a deck of cards. A few flourishes thrown into a card routine can provide wonderful punctuation.
Anonymous

Links to .thecuso are welcome in this post ;)

Hugs,

-Alejandro Portela
Anonymous

Original post can be found here, http://www.thecuso.info/2009/11/dimitri-arleri-opera.html
baffledexpert

Good grief. I’ve seen French auteur cinÃ©ma with shorter introductions and less stuffed-shirt pomposity than that.

42 seconds until we get to see a card trick? Forget it.
robulus

Um, yes he’s very good at card tricks, but the decor in that room made my eyes bleed.

Theatrical masks hung in a row on the wall. There’s just no excuse.
PaulR

Well, to me, the 4 – 6 seconds scene/edits (of which 2-3 seconds are Aleri walking up to his polished-to-perfection-by-the-assistants piano) make me wonder if the real magic is from the editor…
(The only exception is the last trick – but who knows how many times he did it on camera before they got a good take.)

This video feels like soft-core hotel porn. It’s those Dollar Store theatrical masks on the wall…

I’m always impressed by videos where a magician is out on the street, surrounded by people who are close enough to touch him/her, the camera stays on the magician, and they still can’t figure out what is going on.
lo_fye

The title of this article has the name as “Aleri”, but it’s actually “Arleri” in the video.
Bender

Couldn’t even make it until the last trick people are talking about. The camera work is terrible, and soooo many edits. Cut in some scenes of semi-nude women wearing masks making out, and you have an episode of The Red Shoe Diaries.
MattMcKeon

The music sounds an awful lot like Qntal [example].

Tricks are OK, I suppose, but if you sample someone’s music for a video it’s only decent to give them credit.
thequickbrownfox

Better than OK! That’s some hypnotizing stuff there.

(They call it “cardistry”, apparently)
Anonymous

The Virts are a lot -better- I would say. http://www.youtube.com/user/thevirts
I have no mouth and I must scream

An example of my favorite saying “Never play cards with someone who does card tricks, and never do card tricks with people your playing cards with.”
- Piers W
  
  That would surely depend on how well they do the card tricks.
Christovir

I’m not so sure about this. At 4:05 you can see him wearing Boots of Dexterity +5.
relawson

haha! I quit the ol’ smoking habit on oct 30th and i’m trying to do stuff like this instead of lighting up. I got some awesome elusionist cards from ebay and i’m loving the quality. looks like its going to be a few years before i get this good!
ToddBradley

Yeah, I could do that if I didn’t have this beer in my hand.
Anonymous

Wonderful! But it’s not ambient opera, it’s part of a piece for the Vespers of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.
SamSam

I don’t think I would allow this man at my poker table.
searconflex

the video was great, but that last trick made my hands hurt watching it. Â£ÂµÂ¢king incredible.
MarkM

Video: watched.
Mind: blown.
shanealeslie

The first thing my wife said after watching this was ‘ I wonder if he’s good at flicking the bean?’. This kind of display of manual dexterity probably ranks up there with sitting at the end of the bar licking your eyebrows.
demidan

My god, it’s all i can think of to say.
Anonymous

The song is OpÃ©ra, by Emmanuel Santarromana, off the album Pschent.
- Anonymous
  
  Actually, the Pschent is the the Record Company. The song is “OpÃ©ra” off the album “MÃ©tropolitain” by DJ Emmanuel Santarromana.
Eric Ragle

Very impressive but I kept getting distracted by his weird looking arms. *shrug*
MrsBug

Loved the music. thanks for pointing me in the direction of the author.