Bedazzled Review
by "John Beachem" (john_beachem AT hotmail DOT com)February 19th, 2001
BEDDAZLED
Review by John Beachem
* * *
Directed by: Harold Ramis
Written by: Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Larry Gelbart, Harold Ramis, Peter Tolan
Elliot Richards (Brendan Fraser) has always been life's doormat. He lets people walk all over him while trying constantly to ingratiate himself, but it's never worked. Elliot wants to be liked, but what he wants more than anything is Allison (Frances O'Connor). Allison is a beautiful co-worker who doesn't even know Elliot exists, but that's just about to change. While at a bar with his "friends", Elliot meets a woman (Elizabeth Hurley) who claims she can make all of his dreams come true. Promise not to tell who she is? She's the devil. Elliot signs a contract which will give him seven wishes in exchange for his piddling little soul. So, Elliot immediately wishes that he were very rich, and very powerful, and that he were married to Allison. Things don't turn out quite as planned, and Elliot soon figures out that he should be very careful what he wishes for. Since none of his wishes are turning out the way he wants, Elliot wants out of the contract, but that might prove a bit more difficult than he thought. In fact, it might just prove to be impossible.
Okay, I'm going to get any and all comparison's to the original "Bedazzled" out of the way right now. Is this modern retelling as good as the original Dudley Moore/Peter Cook flick? Of course not. Does this one pay any sort of homage to the original? Yes, there's one brief moment where Hurley runs by with two dogs and she calls them Dudley and Peter. Okay, enough comparison, you want to know how this one fares on its own merits, right? Well, if you're looking for a movie with big laughs, look elsewhere. If you're looking for one that isn't predictable, try something else. Above all, if you're looking for one that's not going to sink deep into the depths of schmaltz eventually, try anything else provided it doesn't have Jerry Bruckheimer's name attached to it. What you'll get with "Bedazzled" is a number of chuckles, some likeable characters, and a heavy helping of sentimentality at the end. Does that make the movie worth seeing? For me, no, but you'll have to decide for yourself if it sounds appealing.
Obviously there are only two actors who matter in "Bedazzled", and both do admirable jobs with cliched parts. Brendan Fraser has an excellent sense of comic timing, which he displayed in the unfairly panned film, "The Mummy". In "Bedazzled" he isn't given quite enough chances to display his comic talents. As regular fellow Elliot Richards, Fraser tries to play the character as likeable and goofy, but Elliot is written as obnoxious in his efforts to please everyone. If Elliot had been written as a likeable schmuck it probably would have made the character a bit easier to relate to. Still, Fraser does the best he can, and manages to pull some humor out where none should have existed. Then we have Elizabeth Hurley ("Austin Powers"), who is an absolute delight. Hurley plays the devil not as supremely evil, but more mischievous. She's even likeable in a Bart Simpson sort of way. The fact that it's Elizabeth Hurley, and she wears a variety of low-cut dresses certainly doesn't hurt. Orlando Jones ("The Replacements") does make a brief appearance as Elliot's "friend", Dan, but he's given no comic lines at all.
I'll say right now, "Bedazzled" does have a few highly amusing parts. Unfortunately, you've already seen them in the previews. Elliott's brief stint as a Cuban drug lord is quite entertaining, but more for his reaction upon realizing what he has become than anything that actually occurs while he's the drug lord. In fact, almost all the humor comes from Elliott's reactions to the downsides of his wishes, and the banter between him and Hurley after he exits the wish. After the second wish, this becomes a little redundant. Hurley on screen, quite enjoyable; Hurley off screen, lags big time. Unfortunately, the Hurley off screen moments are much more common. While most of the wishes are easy to predict in advance (and are therefore rather boring), there is one wish Elliott makes that is really quite funny, and wouldn't you know it, it's the shortest one of all. The wish is that Elliott wants to be president of the US, and I won't tell you what Hurley does to mess this one up, but it's certainly unexpected. It's also the only wish that doesn't even look to be going his way from the start.
After the film's rather strange and psychodelic opening credits, I was thinking I might be in for something fairly original. The credits are shot by showing people moving about in a city in fast forward. Everyone then freezes and little captions appear pointing at people. The captions say things like: desperate, drinks from the carton, door mat, double dipper. It's not hilarious or anything, but it was different and I thought the movie might be similar. My mistake.While there are a few amusing parts as mentioned above, the film usually doesn't go after anything less obvious than "Hey look, the guy who knows the names of all the actors in a musical is gay. That's funny, right? Right?" We all know Harold Ramis ("Ghostbusters", "Caddyshack") is an excellent comic director. Why then couldn't he pull more humor out of this script? I don't believe it's his fault. The direction and pacing are as astute as ever, but it seems like the studio execs wanted him to put in neat special effects rather than laughs. That's just the impression I got anyway. By the way, did you notice the number of writers? I'm telling you, the more writers, the worse the movie. I will say this, I enjoyed the movie's upbeat soundtrack; It seemed strangely appropriate. "Bedazzled" runs an average 93 minutes; I'd recommend it to fans of Elizabeth Hurley since she's the best part of the film, and give it three out of five stars.
Comments? Send to: [email protected]
Past reviews can be found at:
http://us.imdb.com/ReviewsBy?John+Beachem
* * * * * - One of the best movies of the year.
* * * * - Great flick, try and catch this one.
* * * - Okay movie, hits and misses.
* * - Pretty bad, see it at your own risk.
* - See this one only if you enjoy pain.
_________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com
--
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
