With a sequel shortly to make an appearance – Nicole Kidman, Sandra Bullock, Stockard Channing and Dianne Wiest (but not Evan Rachel Wood) all reprising their roles – the original Practical Magic from 1998 is now getting a rerelease. This is Griffin Dunne’s smalltown supernatural goof-fest, adapted from a bestseller by Alice Hoffman; the sequel is based on her own follow-up, The Book of Magic. A zanier adventure in occult romance can hardly be imagined, and the elements of grown up noir violence only make it weirder – it is as if The Witches of Eastwick took on something of Thelma & Louise with a decaffeinated David Lynch. Meanwhile, cinematographer Andrew Dunn bathes the daytime scenes in a golden, buttery light.
In a suburban American anytown, buttoned-up residents and frowning soccer moms are disapprovingly obsessed with the fact that the local Owens family womenfolk are witches. There is an amusing “prelude” scene showing a Salem-style public hanging of one of their ancestors; a stark stab of black comedy. In the present day, the Owens sisters Sally and Gillian, played by Bullock and Kidman, are intensely aware of their magical inheritance, as personified by naughty maiden aunts Frances and Bridget, played by Channing and Wiest.
But the two women could hardly be more different. Sally is more sensible, a widowed mother whose late husband tragically fell victim to the curse that awaits any man with whom an Owens woman falls genuinely in love. Single Gillian is a wild child; a rock’n’roll badass who left home as a young woman and fell in love (or lust) with sexy Jimmy Angelov (Goran Visnjic), who turns out to be a psychopathic abuser. Sally and Gillian did what they needed to do to be rid of him, by natural and supernatural means, and now a certain law enforcement official is coming around, asking questions; this is sensitive dreamboat Gary Hallet (Aidan Quinn), who feels the magic of love stirring the moment he sets eyes on his prime suspect, Sally. Bullock then goes into the alluring klutz routine that was her Kitemark for years.
It’s an amusing, if very 90s, movie; the kind that has its own endless afterlife on home entertainment. It’s also interesting to see a small part for stalwart supporting actor Margo Martindale, as one of the sympathetic town women – the kind of character she often played before getting more interesting roles in her silver years.
• Practical Magic is in UK and Irish cinemas from 7 August.
