And so another season passes and the rusted, creaking cogs of the legacy sequel machine continue to turn. The latest bit of IP to fall prey to Hollywood’s vampiric obsession with nostalgia is Practical Magic, the Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock-led Halloween favourite whose cult classic credentials are, in my mind, questionable. It’s a jaunty tale of sororal bonds that blindly slaloms through tones and genres the way only a ’90s film could. It is, upon rewatch, not very good at all. Yet here we are 28 years later, with Practical Magic 2, whether we like it or not.
It’s likely that Practical Magic would have disappeared off the face of the earth if it weren’t for 2010s-era BuzzFeed quizzes, but it has managed to accrue a mid-sized following. No one can actually point to a defining quality in the first film, beyond its gorgeous production design and iconic leads, so with this sequel, you are essentially making a follow-up to the first film’s reputation. Practical Magic 2 seems aware of that, with its marketing blitzkrieg fighting hard to locate any soft, fleshy fondness you have for the original and manipulate it into a ticket sale.
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But even Practical Magic’s most passionate fans won’t have anticipated this 130 minute endurance test of a sequel. Directed by Susanne Bier, Practical Magic 2 sees the return of Bullock and Kidman as witchy sisters Sally and Gillian Owens. They still live in the same handsome clifftop house with their glamorous aunts (Dianne Wiest and Stockard Channing; a privilege to have back onscreen). Both Sally and Gillian have adult daughters (Joey King and Maisie Williams) and possess differing views on the use of magic, which leads one daughter to travel to England and seek out her family history.
For as vibey and cutesy as the first film looked, there was no accounting for Practical Magic 2’s 130 minute crusade to flesh out the lore of an ancestral witch character briefly seen in flashback at the start of the first film. Practical Magic 2 contorts itself in knots trying to justify its existence, testing your patience and whatever appreciation you possess for Practical Magic. Its greatest sin is that it’s boring, with a thin plot stretched to breaking point and glacially paced longueurs of dead air. For example, at one point Kidman’s Gillian delightedly reveals a gift for one of her aunts – a brand-new Ninja SLUSHi frozen drinks machine! It’s painful enough to bring a tear to your eye. Then, when Practical Magic 2’s threadbare narrative tidies itself up 110 minutes in, you’re subjected to a further 20 minutes of indulgent throwbacks and vacuous attempts at character development.
While the first film was tonally inconsistent, it at least had the insane confidence to enmesh scenes of violent domestic abuse with the twee soundtrack and sugary schmaltz of a Chris Columbus film. Practical Magic 2’s attempts at a plot veer closer to The Worst Witch than anything, having shed any hint of darkness or maturity. Indeed, Sally and Gillian no longer feel like characters, with both Kidman and Bullock dialling up the quirkiness to the point that the Owens sisters appear stuck in childlike arrested development. Each odd attempt at humour outstays its welcome – there’s a terrible recurring bit about custard-based flirting – and both actors are visibly adrift in this material. It’s particularly sad for Bullock, whose screen appearances are so rare that this feels like a massive missed opportunity.
Ultimately, Practical Magic 2 has no idea what it’s trying to do. It’s lacking in magic in just about every sense – there is, genuinely, far less spellcasting than you would expect – and possesses no real point of view for the Owens sisters. The fact that the first film is such a structural mess actually left the door open for some imagination here, but it’s too committed to its tedious plot. It’s a proper delight to have Dianne Wiest and Stockard Channing in films again – they bring a real elegance and prestige to proceedings – but that’s about it. A sequel to Practical Magic may sound like a nice idea but, in practice, this is a chore.
