The movie is really quite harmless, and it's a pleasant diversion from much of the raunch that passes for humor today.
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Time was, I could have said that "Bell, Book and Candle" inspired the television series "Bewitched" and everyone would have known what I was talking about. Then, "Bewitched" became almost ancient history until the 2005 Nicole Kidman movie. I'm feeling my age. Trust me, this 1958 Jimmy Stewart-Kim Novak fantasy, based on John Van Druten's Broadway play, was never all that well liked but enough so to engender a far more popular TV show. "Bell, Book and Candle" is not a comedy classic, but it holds up as a charming bit of whimsy.
Stewart is a New York publisher, Sheperd Henderson, engaged to be married and living in an apartment in Greenwich Village. Novak runs a shop downstairs selling African artifacts, curios, and whatnot. She is a witch, Gillian Holroyd, and when the film opens she is a very bored witch. She sets her sights on Shep. With the help of her brother Nicky, played by Jack Lemmon, and her aunt Queenie, played by Elsa Lanchester, she casts a love spell on him. To further the mischief, the trio summon a writer of the occult, Sidney Ridlitch, played by Ernie Kovacs, from Mexico to publish his next book with Shep. The book is to be about witchcraft in New York, and Nicky will collaborate.
The film doesn't quite sustain its magic for a full 103 minutes, but it comes close. Nor does it go for many big laughs-out-loud. It's a sweet, gentle comedy with a few romantic twists that continue to delight. Agreed, the Stewart-Novak relationship is a little strained, he being about twenty-five years older than she was when the movie was made. In fact, at age fifty this would be Stewart's last role as a romantic leading man. Nevertheless, we root for the two to find happiness. Incidentally, I hadn't remembered how beautiful and sexy Ms. Novak was in the role.
Kovacs as the crackpot author is a kick and reminds us what a great loss to motion pictures and television his death was. Lemmon is as nervous and squirmy as ever in his part as the carefree brother warlock. And the two ladies, Lanchester and Hermione Gingold, as a pair of old witches are inspired. Director Richard Quine had had success with similar films--the musical adaptation of "My Sister Eileen," the humorous "Solid Gold Cadillac," and the antic "Operation Mad Ball"--but in "Bell, Book and Candle" he hit his stride. It was nominated for two Academy Awards, Best Costume Design and Best Art Direction.
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