“Expose of Sleight of Hand” is a vintage 1960’s silver short presented by Castle Film’s originally released on 8mm film. It shows the notable magician and author John Scarne in his prime performing card tricks. Castle Film’s is a California based film company established by former newsreel cameraman Eugene Castle in 1924. The film company was widely known for productions such as “Christmas-Time in Toyland” and the “News Parade” Series. Scarne was particularly gifted at card manipulation and would go on to author a number of books on the subject. He was hired by the U.S. Army in order to educate soldiers on the dangers of cards and dice cheats. His film mostly shows various card tricks and Scarne shuffling as well as dealing out cards for games.

(00:00) It opens with the Castle Films logo (:06) and title screen (:10). A player lays his hand face up over poker chips (:25). Scarne’s hands fan out a deck (:36) and he performs slow motion two hand card tricks (:40). He folds the deck up his forearm (:53). The magician performs a trick with cups and wooden cubes or dice (1:07). Good shots follow of the card manipulator sorting through a stack (1:43). He spreads the cards (1:58) and cuts the deck (2:25). A drop back shot shows three players at the table along with Scarne as the dealer (3:32). He sets cards out for a trick (3:51). The camera pauses as he puts the deck back together (4:29). Scarne prepares for another trick (5:25). Shots follow from under the table (5:39) to show his actions. He deals out cards for a four-card trick (7:17) unveiling four Queens (7:51). A smoking guest is surprised (7:53). He shuffles and cuts the deck for a trick involving the players (7:59). A hand pulls an Ace of Clubs from the deck (8:01). He sets a highball glass atop a queen of clubs (8:17). He pulls the card pulled by the participating guest and sits in atop the high ball glass (8:24). The cards are ‘magically’ flipped during the trick (8:28). Scarne performs another trick (8:40). Slow motion shots show his hand trick as he stealthily switches cards (9:06). Wide shots show the dealer and players in a lounge (10:15) complete with fireplace and bookcase. Scarne cuts the deck number of times (10:27). The film concludes on the Castle films logo (10:54).

Motion picture films don’t last forever; many have already been lost or destroyed. For almost two decades, we’ve worked to collect, scan and preserve the world as it was captured on 35mm, 16mm and 8mm movies — including home movies, industrial films, and other non-fiction. If you have endangered films you’d like to have scanned, or wish to donate celluloid to Periscope Film so that we can share them with the world, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us via the weblink below.

This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com