Bewitched (film)

We weren't allowed to watch Bewitched while growing up. Daddy said it was racist.

The 2005 film adaptation of the series of the same name... sort of, written and directed by Nora Ephron. It stars Will Ferrell as Jack Wyatt, an egocentric actor whose last few films have been flops. Jack is looking for a role with which to make a comeback before his career does a complete nosedive. What he and his agent Ritchie (Jason Schwartzman) decide on is a new version of the classic Sitcom Bewitched re-conceived as a starring vehicle for Jack, in which he will play Darrin.

Meanwhile, Isabel Bigelow (Nicole Kidman) has moved to L.A. to demonstrate to both herself and her family that she is a modern, independent woman capable of living on her own. Unlike most young women who do so, though, Isabel is a genuine witch in the same mold as Samantha, and is determined to prove that she can live without magic, just like the mortals do. She's not quite good at it, nor at the mortal world in general, but she gets some help from her new next-door neighbor and best friend Maria.

Naturally, Jack -- who is looking for an unknown to play Samantha, the better to spotlight himself on the show -- stumbles across Isabel as she twitches her nose in a conveniently familiar way. He convinces her to audition for the role, and she gets it. But once it becomes clear that she's little more than a piece of stage dressing on The Jack Wyatt Show, she decides to make a few changes.

And as magic swirls around herself, Jack, and the brand-new version of Bewitched, characters from the show begin to come to life, offering their own help and advice, for better and worse...

Post Modern Hilarity Ensues, as does (eventually) romance.

Tropes used in Bewitched (film) include:

Animated Credits Opening: for the Show Within a Show, which completely hides Samantha's face and highlights Darrin's, to emphasize that the show is about Jack and only Jack.
Anyone Got a Light?: A bleary, unsteady Jack asks for a light at a meeting of the show's production team right after Isabel's reveal and their subsequent break-up. Everyone in the room, even the non-smokers, holds out a lit lighter. Amusingly, Jack somehow still manages to fail to light his cigarette from the closest one (held by his agent Ritchie).
Behind the Black: One of the ways that Isabel's father Nigel appears -- in particular, he enters a scene as Isabel's talking to a projection of him, and walks right past her to linger in the rear of the shot until she turns and walks past him. Even distracted, she probably should have noticed him as he passed within a foot or two of her.
Brick Joke: When Jack convinces Isabel to come back to the show after she quits, she complains that she just can't walk back in. Jack, who chased after her in a golf cart, tells her, "If you come riding in on a golf cart, all is forgiven." At the climax of the film, as he chases her through the studio to apologize for his Freak-Out and ask her to stay, he actually stops running to jump in a golf cart.
Catapult Nightmare: Jack wakes from one where he both meets Uncle Arthur for the first time, and then walks out naked onto the set of Late Night with Conan O'Brien.
Continuity Reboot: In-universe, the new Bewitched TV series starring Jack and Isabel.
Cordon Bleugh Chef: Uncle Arthur:

Jack Wyatt: [takes a drink of something Uncle Arthur has just made in the blender] This tastes awful!
Uncle Arthur: I know. I just like to blend.

Distant Finale: The final scene of the movie takes place six months after the rest of the film, and after Jack and Isabel get married.
The Ditz: Isabel (unintentionally and incorrectly) gives this impression, thanks to at best a partial understanding of the mortal world.
Drives Like Crazy: Uncle Arthur, in Jack's Porsche.
Environmental Symbolism: Sort of. When Isabel finally gets mad, a painted flat of storm clouds begins roiling and flashing with lightning and thunder as she passes.
Expy: Besides the actors and actress, half the characters outside the show are expies of someone in the series. This doesn't count actual characters from the show who begin to appear around Jack and Isabel.
Flying Broomstick: Isabel owns a nice collapsible model which can fit into her purse when she's not using it.
Forgotten Theme Tune Lyrics: Remembered here -- the Steve Lawrence recording of the Bewitched theme plays during a particularly romantic moment.
Freak-Out: Jack doesn't take it very well when Isabel demonstrates that she is a real witch.
Functional Magic: Well, duh. It's Bewitched. But in addition to the Rule Magic of the Witch Species in the film, there is the Magic Realism-verging-on-Wild Magic surrounding both Isabel and Jack, most noticeably manifesting as characters from the original show appearing to advise them.
Gold Digger: Jack's ex-wife Sheila, who has been stringing him along on finalizing their divorce, and tries to get back together with him when it becomes obvious that the Bewitched reboot is going to be a massive hit.
Heartbreak and Ice Cream: Played out with tubs of Cool Whip instead of ice cream.
Hot Witch: Isabel. And for those who remember what she looked like in the 1950s, Shirley MacLaine...
I Just Want to Be Normal: Isabel tells her father this is her reason for moving into the mortal world.
The Ingenue: Isabel.
Jerkass: Jack. But he eventually becomes the Jerkass With a Heart of Gold.
Lampshading
Large Ham: All of Jack's characters. Jack himself. Especially after Isabel hexes him and he starts over-acting on-camera.
- Iris, too.
Let Him Choose: A dog in one episode of the show, and thanks to Isabel's magic, the dog Takes a Third Option.
Line-of-Sight Name: It's not made absolutely clear, but it's strongly hinted that Isabel took her last name from the tea she was drinking in the coffee shop when Jack met her. Her father Nigel follows her lead on it later.
Living Prop: Isabel's intended role, despite playing Samantha, on the remake of Bewitched -- at least initially. After Isabel quits and Jack convinces her to come back, she actually has a real part.
Love Potion: Combined with Love Makes You Crazy in the "hex" put on Jack by Aunt Clara and Isabel.
Magical Gesture: In addition to Samantha's trademark nose-twitch, Isabel has one of her own -- tugging on her ear. Iris notices Isabel doing it and comments on it, although at the time she appears to be solely giving advice about avoiding Character Tics as an actor.
- Iris has one as well -- a very classic flick-of-the-fingers.
Man Child: Jack, who throws tantrums when things don't go his way, and relies on Ritchie for most of his day-to-day survival skills. Interestingly, once he realizes that he needs Isabel, if only for the show to be a success, he seems to start growing up.
Masquerade: Maintained by the real Witch Species.
The Missus and the Ex: Jack's ex-wife Sheila shows up on set when it becomes obvious that the show is going to be a hit. After delivering a backhanded compliment to Isabel, she tries to get back together with Jack. Isabel derails her plans with a little magic.
Mister Seahorse: Jack briefly worries if he'll become one during his Freak-Out when he learns about Isabel's true nature.
Mundane Utility: At first, Isabel tries to avoid using magic at all, later she uses magic to plug in the TV set.
Naive Newcomer: For someone planning on moving wholesale into a brand new culture, Isabel is remarkably unprepared for and uninformed about mortal life.
Nice Character, Mean Actor: Jack Wyatt is not very nice, although Isabel is fooled at first by his charm.
Nosy Neighbor: Gladys Kravitz herself -- along with husband Abner -- makes an appearance in the final moments of the film.
"Not Wearing Pants" Interview: Jack dreams that he's walked onto the set of the Conan O'Brien show naked.
Offscreen Teleportation: One of the other ways Nigel appears in a scene.
The Other Darrin: Referenced in-universe.
Painting the Medium: Well, the original medium. When Aunt Clara vanishes, she turns into a line that shrinks into a dot before "blipping" out -- just like the image on an old CRT TV when it's turned off.
Portal Picture: Nigel walks out of a columned hall which turns out to be a painted flat when two stagehands come by and carry it off.
Product Placement: Multiple instances, in a mix of in-your-face and subtle, for products, stores, restaurants and even tourist attractions.
- One very blatant example is a grocery shopping sequence where they are used for story purposes -- Isabel's father manifests his face on packages of Newman's Own popcorn, Green Giant canned vegetables and Gorton's frozen fish sticks, among others.
- Isabel, who apparently adores Cool Whip, buys a dozen tubs of it (and is seen eating it like ice cream later in the film).
Real After All: The immortal Witch Species living alongside normal humans. One begins to wonder what the folks who made the original Bewitched really knew...
Reality Warper: What the real witches' and warlocks' powers appear to be, even more so than their TV counterparts.
Reassigned to Antarctica: Isabel does this to Jack's gold digger ex, Sheila -- after isabel magically compels her to finally sign their divorce papers, Sheila then announces she's moving to Reykjavík -- even though she doesn't know where it is, and when told Iceland, notes that she doesn't like ice.
Recursive Canon: Strongly hinted at. There's just too much similarity between the Bewitched TV show and the world of "real" witches and warlocks for it to be just coincidence.
Recursive Reality: Characters from the original Bewitched series start manifesting around Isabel and Jack, including Aunt Clara and Uncle Arthur.
Recycled Script: In-universe: the episodes of the show we see being shot appear to be remakes of scripts from the original series.
Reset Button: Pressed in-universe by Isabel, after she decides she doesn't like the effects of a spell she cast on Jack.
- She does it again after she magically drops a suspended lighting rig on Jack's ex-wife, choosing to do something less fatal to her instead.
The Reveal: At the party for the show held in Jack's house (after he gets it back from his ex-wife), Isabel reveals to Jack that she is actually a very real witch. Jack doesn't take it well.
Second Act Breakup: The result of Isabel revealing that she is a witch to Jack.
Show Within a Show: Both Bewitched, the original TV series, and the remake around which the movie revolves.
- Also Jack's various films -- An Onion for Willy, Atticus Rex, and Last Year in Katmandu, to name a few -- bits of which we get to see.
The Take: Jack claims that much of his success as an actor comes from several reactions that he uses with great frequency, including Double Takes, Eye Takes and something fairly close to a real-life Wild Take. He demonstrates them to Isabel, who later comes across his movies on TV and sees them "in context".
The Television Talks Back: One of the things Isabel tries to convince Jack that she's really a witch.
Terrible Interviewees Montage: The seemingly-endless series of actresses -- including a few cameos by big names -- trying unsuccessfully to wiggle their noses like Elizabeth Montgomery.
Throw It In: During pre-production, Will Ferrell and Nicole Kidman took part in an improvisational exercise to help them get in-character. The entire thing so amused Nora Ephron and the rest of the production team that they inserted it word-for-word into the script as an improvisational exercise between Jack and Isabel, right down to Kidman's plaintive "how much longer do we have to do this?" at the end.
Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The vast majority of magic performed in front of the Muggles -- when Isabel gets angry, for instance -- doesn't actually seem to register with the people around her.
The Voiceless: Samantha is initially this in the remake in order to turn it into a vehicle for Jack; after Isabel discovers this, she got a bit upset. Later averted when Isabel quits and Jack convinces her to come back to the show -- it becomes very much a two-lead vehicle.
Witch Species: Exists in-universe, maintaining a very similar Masquerade vis-a-vis the mortal world as in the original Bewitched.