Because everything old must be made new again and also repurposed for an apparently more lily-livered audience called Gen Z, we’ve been given The Craft: Legacy. Neither “reboot” nor “sequel” nor “remake”–no matter what they try to tell you–the movie falls more into the category of botched homage. And, were it not for the backstabbing appearance of Fairuza “Nancy Downs” Balk and the use of the film’s most iconic line (“We are the weirdos, mister”), it didn’t really need to be billed as anything other than another C-rate (which is an overly kind letter to give it) direct-to-video release. Alas, no one likes to make things without a built-in audience, or at least an audience that might be willingly destroyed by the new rendering.
Directed and written by Zoe Lister-Jones (who birthed a critical darling in 2017 with Band Aid), some part of us wants to believe that the suits producing it must have fucked it up somehow along the way. Otherwise, why would any of these actors have agreed to sign on? Unless those making movies right now are genuinely this flaccid about the message they want to convey in order to appeal to the Gen Z softness that has almost completely taken over all of pop culture. In a certain regard, The Craft: Legacy falls prey to the same problems as Netflix’s atrocious Hubie Halloween in that it must assure its viewers bullying is bad, and that anyone who does it needs a serious lesson–whether that comes in the form of an overwrought lecture or a magical spell.
Opening on Frankie (Gideon Adlon), Tabby (Lovie Simone) and Lourdes (Zoey Luna) trying to cast a spell to freeze time, they realize their coven is useless without a fourth member to represent the “West” in the four corners permutation. This, of course, manifests in the form of Lily Schechner (Cailee Spaeny)–the Sarah Bailey (Robin Tunney) of the outfit. In point of fact, this is the only character besides the “requisite black girl” that can be distinguished as bearing some resemblance to the quartet of main characters in the original. Gone are any traces of a venomous, take no prisoners ringleader like Nancy Downs, or someone meek to be bullied so that she can come back ten times bitchier once she has powers (this being both Sarah and Bonnie Harper, played by Neve Campbell). No, instead everyone is all very “nice” and “welcoming,” even after Lily suffers the embarrassment of getting her very heavy period in the middle of class–which is mercilessly called out by “popular asshole,” Timmy (Nicholas Galitzine). As the Chris Hooker (Skeet Ulrich) of the movie, he lacks the cachet of being a bona fide knave designed for the purpose of Nancy Downs giving one of her greatest monologues in the movie as she screams while levitating in front of him, “You don’t even exist to me! You don’t exist! You are nothing! You are shit! You don’t exist. The only way you know how to treat women is by treating them like whores! Well, you’re the whore! And this is gonna stop! Do you understand! Do you understand what I’m saying?”
That level of chutzpah and vindictiveness is, speaking of not existing, nonexistent in The Craft: Legacy. And if it’s intended to be funneled entirely into David Duchovny’s stepfather character, Adam Harrison, it doesn’t work. Although it’s clear he’s meant to embody some patriarchal trope trying to keep women down and drain them of their power. Yet even the “final showdown” that this results in lacks anything resembling “climax.” Still, even most critics admitting to the “blandness” (another polite euphemism) of the movie have been reluctant to outright tear it to shreds, Nancy Downs-style, fearful of stepping on any toes that might accuse these “naysayers” of not being “sex-positive,” etc./encouraging of promoting a “healthy” theme about being who you want to be and not being afraid of the judgment of others. For that is the main and only crutch The Craft: Legacy uses to hold itself up as a means of defense against the outright evisceration it deserves. Maybe that’s why the movie, as of Halloween 2020, holds only a nine percent lower difference at 47% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer, compared to the original’s 56%. It just goes to show that there is truly no accounting for (lack of) taste in the present landscape.
As we wait for the majority of the one hour and thirty minute duration for something–anything–to actually happen, the dialogue-heavy movie seems content to delight in its message of encouraging responsible witchcraft-wielding, never judging a book by its cover and treating others with respect and kindness even (gasp!) when you’re a jock. Perhaps this “evenness” building toward nothing stems from the producers spending all the production budget on getting Fairuza Balk to appear for a few seconds and using Alanis Morissette’s “Hand In My Pocket” at the beginning of the movie when Lily and her mother are driving (presumably an intended “nod” to the 90s, during which The Craft was born)–one of the many cringeworthy moments of the “narrative.” Whatever the reason for this non-plot, it isn’t justifiable for an emphasis on inane dialogue that leads the story nowhere slowly, serving only to casually mention the expected things Gen Z is purported to “respect”: trans acknowledgement, bisexuality, general “wokeness,” the black girl declaring she wishes she had more black friends, and (in a move that smacks of out of touch pandering) Princess Nokia.
It’s enough to send you to the mental institution right there with Nancy Downs as you fall through the rabbit hole of the lazy (and just bad) writing that has created so many plot cavities. Next time, maybe someone can pay Diablo Cody to try her hand at a remake when she’s not busy helping Madonna with her biopic. At least there would then be, at the barest of minimums, a Jennifer’s Body sense of irony.
