Nicole Kidman Tribute: Bewitched (2005)

Thursday, June 20, 2024 at 2:00PM
Christopher James in 2005, AFI, Bewitched, Female Directors, Nicole Kidman, Nora Ephron, Will Ferrell, comedy

by Christopher James

Yes, I've come back here to defend another much-maligned Nicole Kidman comedy. I swear I love her dramatic roles too, but there's always something strange, special and unnerving about Kidman's comedy work, like seeing a dog walk on its hind legs and smile. 

Bewitched is Nora Ephron’s Ishtar - a big budget box office failure whose greatest crime is throwing too much against the wall. I’d always rather have a movie that tried to do too much outside of the norm, rather than something deeply middling. Bewitched is most interesting in the ways it swings and misses because Ephron and Kidman both give it their all, striking out gloriously. It’s as if the studio got one note (hire Will Ferrell) and decided to never check on the movie again. Their obviousness is our pleasure...

Nicole does NOT play Samantha. She plays Isabel Bigelow, a witch who descends on Los Angeles with a desire to live a normal life… without magic. What’s the first thing a normal person needs? A job. While at the bookstore, she gets noticed by notoriously derided actor Jack Wyatt (Ferrell). Jack is coming off a string of epic flops and is looking for a surefire win with his latest project - a remake of Bewitched, with Darren as the focus. The one thing missing was his Samantha, a cute newbie who can crinkle her nose and fade into the background. Isabel gets the job, but doesn’t understand how little she would be doing until she gets onto set. She can either quit, or get even.

Let’s just say magic helps with making Jack’s life a living hell.

It's here that the movie goes way down the Looney Toons portal and never comes out. Every twenty minutes, the clock resets. Isabel hexes Jack so he falls in love with her. This makes him too obsessed and she removes the hex. Jack then tries to get Isabel back… until Isabel comes out as a witch. Then he rebuffs her, but then he chases her. On top of it all, Nicole Kidman and Will Ferrell have negative chemistry. It’s as if they each spoke a different language and were only catching every third word the other is saying. Combined with a script that’s the patchwork quilt of four different movies, Bewitched is a bewildering experience and one I can’t help returning to often.

This is what I love about Nicole Kidman. She’s going to play with the band as the Titanic sinks. Isabel is not a meek wallflower. Nicole plays her like a Lucille Ball-esque daffy goon, flitting around the screen. Her voice is higher and her giggles are louder. Kidman is an utter joy to watch. She brings the same level of energy and vigor to Bewitched that she does to The Hours, and that’s the mark of a truly great actress. It’s not just energy that Kidman brings to Isabel, there’s one grounding, consistent force that binds her character to some reality.

Isabel wants to live a normal life, but struggles with how to achieve that. She’s a teenager in an adult’s body, a person trying to make it on their own without the crutches that have supported them their whole life. This earnestness and sweetness make Isabel a character worth following. Just as there’s big swings in the narrative, the cast packs a similar surprising punch. The supporting cast is a who’s who of big names and up-and-comers at the time. Michael Caine and Shirley MacLaine steal scenes as Isabel’s lothario Father and as the vain actress inhabiting the role of Endora, respectively. 

As Jack’s dutiful and faithful manager, Jason Schwartzman mines quite a bit of comedy and proves to be the more anchoring foil to Ferrell’s grandiosity. We’ve seen Kristen Chenoweth be smiley and energetic before, but she must’ve drunk three red bulls before every take as Isabel’s neighbor, Maria. Late in the film, Steve Carell (the same year as 40-Year-Old Virgin) takes over the movie giving a spot-on Paul Lynde impression as Uncle Arthur. More appearances from Stephen Colbert, David Alan Grier, Amy Sedaris and Richard Kind punctuate this strange movie. Yet, it’s the audacity, excess and sheer pluck of the project that dares one to love it.

 

This comedic bomb led Kidman down some of the darkest days of her career. Thankfully, the actress’s auteur hunger still resulted in interesting projects, even if critics and audiences didn’t appreciate them. Margot at the Wedding is our next stop.

Article originally appeared on The Film Experience (http://thefilmexperience.net/).