Law and Magic Blog

An Interview With Jon Ronson (the Men Staring at Goats Guy)

eSkeptic has an interview with Jon Ronson, author of The Men Who Stare at Goats, here. The film opens wide this November.

Staring At Goats, Big Screen

The Guardian's Andrew Pulver has this "first look" at George Clooney's adaptation of Jon Ronson's "The Men Who Stare at Goats," which premieres at the Venice Film Festival, and is set to open wide this fall. The film centers on a U.S. army unit that investigates (and seems to believe in) psychic powers.

Ghosts, Ghosts, Ghosts--Everywhere You Look

This Hollywood Reporter article sums up a number of Hollywood projects centered on ghosts or "ghost-related" issues. Among them, Dreamworks' new "Boo U.", which may not be the movie's final title, about a ghost who needs additional training, to be directed by Tony Leondis, scheduled for release in 2012. "Freakers," which would have told a story from the "ghosts' point of view," seems to have been abandoned. Too bad. That sounded interesting. Finally, someone is pitching another "ghost project."

Just shows to go ya--on film, on tv, in books, on the net, in magic, ghosts continue to be popular.

Poisoning the Field

What a great idea for a law review article. David S. Caudill, Villanova University School of Law, has published "Arsenic and Old Chemistry: Images of Mad Alchemists, Experts Attacking Experts, and the Crisis in Forensic Science," in volume 15 of Boston University Journal of Science and Technology Law (2009). Here is the abstract. 

Drawing on research into the use of experts in early 19th-century criminal trials, the image of mad alchemists in popular culture representations of science, and the distinction between empirical and contingent "interpretive repertoires" in the discourse of scientific controversies, this article explores the controversy over arsenic-detection technologies prior to the Marsh test. In addition to noting the predictable criticism of incompetent expertise in the service of law, this article highlights implied accusations of hubris and amorality on the part of over-confident experts, both in the early 19th-century and in today's crisis of forensic science.

Download the article from SSRN here.

"The Men Who Stare At Goats" May Be Staring At Us From the Big Screen Soon

That "Men Who Stare At Goats" movie may be nearing a distribution deal, according to The Hollywood Reporter. George Clooney, Kevin Spacey, and Jeff Daniels star in the pic, about the Army's search to pin down paranormal powers, documented in Jon Ronson's really funny book of the same name. 

Secret Societies, Just In Time For "Angels and Demons"

From MSNBC.com, a look at some secret societies, including the Illuminati. Turns out that group was started by a professor of canon law named Adam Weishaupt. Oh, those wild and crazy law professors!

Harry Potter Film Headed For Early Release

The new Harry Potter film will be opening wide July 15, a couple of days earlier than originally scheduled, to take advantage of empty movie screen and anxious theatergoers. Read more here.

Michael Caine Plays Retired Magician In New Film

Michael Caine is making playing magical types something of a specialty. After his bravura turn as Mr. Cutter, the creator of illusions, in The Prestige, he's returning to the big screen as Clarence, a retired magician, in Is Anybody There?

Magical Legalism

A four-year-old post from the Volokh Conspiracy, but still mightily interesting...Eugene asks about "magical legalism"--"stories about law or lawyers that are basically set in the real world but with some magical or fantastic twist." He also asks who actually invented this phrase. I wonder if that person ever got back to him.

In the comments are some wonderful suggestions, including Randall Garrett's Lord Darcy stories, a Simpsons Halloween episode, Stephen Vincent Benet's The Devil and Daniel Webster, Wolff & Byrd, and some of Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein's work. I think I'd also throw in James Blish's A Case of Conscience and H. Beam Piper's Little Fuzzy series, which deal with norms if not law. See also this page from TVTropes.

Incidentally, I Googled the term "magical legalism" and I did find a use of the term in a work by Julieta Lemaitre called Legal Fetishism at Home and Abroad. Here's the sentence. "In legal theory the persistent metaphor to describe personal attachment to law is religious: such attachment is described as faith in law, devotion to law, a myth of rights, magical legalism and especially, legal fetishism—the adoration of law as if it were something different from the will of men." Not quite the same meaning as above.

New Houdini Book May Make It To the Big Screen

Authors Larry Sloman and William Kalush have closed a deal over movie rights to their Houdini bio The Secret Life of Houdini with Summit Entertainment. The next step: finding someone (or someones) to create a script out of the book. That kind of thing isn't magic.