BEFORE: I can't talk about the afterlife, of course, without dealing with the Devil (last seen in "Needful Things"). I don't mean "making a deal with the Devil", of course, but that is the main topic of conversation here. I'll watch both versions of this film, but the remake comes first, not just for comparative purposes, but also because I can easily link from Matt Damon through "School Ties" to Brendan Fraser (last seen in "Looney Tunes: Back in Action").
THE PLOT: Hopeless dweeb Elliot Richards is granted 7 wishes by the devil to snare Allison, the girl of his dreams, in exchange for his soul.
AFTER: There's something fundamentally wrong about any deal with the devil portrayed in fiction - once Satan says, "At the end of the deal, I get your soul." The only appropriate human response at that point should be "No deal." Because if you take half a second to think about it, the fact that the Devil is standing there is proof of the Heaven/Hell concept, and all the old Biblical rules apply, and this whole life is preparation for the eternal paradise or damnation.
I fall back on "Damn Yankees", where the temptation to play in the major leagues was SO great that the condemned man didn't care, or we can go old-school back to Faust, where a man was SO dissatisfied with his life that he didn't see any other way to improve it than to take that deal. So focusing on a man who wants to date a particular girl doesn't seem to cut it. Jeez, just find another girl.
My point is, signing that contract with the Devil is NEVER a recommended move (are you listening, Marvel Comics?) for several reasons. Aside from eternal damnation, it colors everything that happens to the character after that (note to editors of Spider-Man comics: Fix it. Heroes do not make deals with Satan.) On top of that, the Devil cheats. You think lawyers are bad? The Devil probably could put some language in the contract that's microscopic. Oh, you didn't think to look at the contract under a microscope, literally? Not his problem.
But what the movie gets right is casting a babe like Elizabeth Hurley to play the devil (combining two characters from the original movie, if I understand it correctly). Do you think Satan's going to have red skin and horns, and a forked tail? That's a bit obvious - he'd probably do better looking like a hunky guy, or a bodacious woman, depending on your preference. In the past decade he's been played on TV by slick suit-wearing actors like John Glover and Ray Wise, riffing on the Satan-as-CEO vibe. Whatever helps tell a story, I suppose.
But this film has a version of A.D.D. and can't even stick with its own premise. The Devil implies that all her mark has to do is phrase his wish better, only to throw him into a scenario that proves he didn't think it through well enough. Before long this just turns into "What crazy premise can we throw this character into?" and drags along his workmates to appear in his fantasy, like the farmhands in "The Wizard of Oz".
Plenty of plot holes, but nothing here is meant to be taken seriously. Just some more dime-store philosophy about being true to yourself and not wanting more than you have. I'll get a better handle on the story after I watch the original tomorrow.
But hey, another film with San Francisco scenery - they were probably all around before, but I'm just noticing since I now recognize the city. There's a nice shot of Coit Tower in the background in the last shot of the film, so I feel like I know exactly where the main character's apartment was.
Also starring Elizabeth Hurley (last seen in "Permanent Midnight"), Frances O'Connor (last seen in "Windtalkers"), Orlando Jones (last seen in "Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant"), with a cameo from Brian Doyle-Murray (last seen in "Modern Problems").
RATING: 4 out of 10 slam-dunks
Of course, the clever thing about a deal with the Devil is because it's a win-win for the Prince of Darkness. Even if you manage to weasel out of it and make it to the Pearly Gates, the fact that you coveted something (aka "broke the 10th commandment") so hard that you worked with the Leader of the Opposition is DEFINITELY going to come in the entrance interview.
ReplyDeleteI think I've seen a few clips of the remake on cable. I can't imagine why they went forward with a formal remake. "Man thoughtlessly makes a deal with devil, hijinx ensue" is a vague enough concept that you don't need the source material; unlike "The Pink Panther" the source movie is deeply a cult movie with no real mass-market awareness; like "The Pink Panther," the original "Bedazzled" is an utterly ordinary movie made extraordinary by its cast.