Bedazzled 2000: The Devil and Koyaanisqatsi

The 2000 remake of Bedazzled is one of those movies that I would probably enjoy a whole lot more if not for the movie itself, if that makes sense.

A reworking of  Stanley Donen's classic 1967 Faustian comedy starring Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, our protagonist is Elliot (Brendan Fraser), a lonely office worker who's picked up at a bar by the Devil and presented with the offer of a lifetime - seven wishes in exchange for ownership rights to his soul. The unique hook here being that the big D appears in the form of the tantalising Elizabeth Hurley. She's zeroed in on Elliot in part due to his low ranking in the social food chain, but what makes him particularly vulnerable to the she-Devil's machinations is his love-sickness for his work colleague Alison (Frances O'Connor), and it's Lucy-fer's supposed ability to make their union possible that seals the deal. The Devil is nice enough to give Elliot an escape clause, whereby once he's had enough of a particular wish, he has the option of cancelling it and returning to his default reality (she could have gotten him to burn through his seven wishes a heck of a lot faster if she wasn't so generous).

The establishing act is, honestly, fine. The sequences where Elliot meets the Devil and is seduced to the dark side are where the film is at its most breezy and likeable. It's once we get into the "meat" of the story, where Elliot starts making his wishes and the Devil delights in corrupting them (and the obtuse Elliot does make it supremely easy for her), that the experience becomes a drag. We know that none of Elliot's wishes are going to work out as he wants, and the presence of a reset button means that we also know that whatever happens in each individual reality ultimately won't have any lasting consequences for the overarching narrative. With that in mind, it all comes down to how entertaining the wish fulfilment sequences are as their own self-contained set-pieces. The original 1967 film pulls it off. The remake not so much, part of the problem being that the sketches have a tendency to advertise their solution upfront. It's usually too transparent from the outset what went wrong with Elliot's wish for the playing out to be very much fun. Likewise, God shows up and intervenes in Elliot's journey, and it's supposed to be a twist which character he is, but you'll have figured it out the instant you lay eyes on them. There is seriously only one character that he could be (clue: it was 2000, and Hollywood was caught up in a passionate love affair with the Magical Negro). For a film about playing with fire, Bedazzled 2000 ultimately suffers from playing things just a little too safe; in the end, even the Devil's sultry temptress act seems more cute than artfully charismatic.

In spite of my complaints, I come away still somewhat liking Bedazzled 2000, but it's definitely a film that benefits from the presence of a fast forward button (in fact, I think there is a potentially promising edit to be had in implementing a visible fast forward through all of Elliot's wish sequences). The most intriguing aspect of Bedazzled is the sequence that accompanies the opening credits. Here, we supposedly see the Earth from the Devil's perspective, as she scans the population for susceptible clientele, momentarily freezing on a prospective target while a caption appears on screen, each giving us a little window in that individual's coveted soul. Subjects are defined as "honest", "optimist" and "talks during movies". Her unwitting quarry are overwhelmingly human, although she momentarily considers going after a dog bearing the "neurotic" label (I'd be curious to see how that scenario would play out, actually). What's intriguing about this opening is that the Devil's eye-perspective of Earth and its denizens seems deliberately reminiscent of Godfrey Reggio's seminal arthouse flick Koyaanisqatsi (1982). In particular, the credits are reminiscent of the film's most infamous sequence, "The Grid", in which we get to observe the denizens of modern urbanisation from a bombardment of different vantage points. Many of the same techniques are deployed - time-lapse photography featuring crowds of people rushing about their daily grind, perspective shots enabling us to hurtle along overpasses at gut-wrenching speed, sped-up clouds that offer an intermittent glimpse of the natural world existing on the sidelines.

The title of Reggio's film comes from the Hopi language, and translates to "life out of balance". The title being the biggest giveaway that the film is intended as an indictment of this way of life; the film itself eschews commentary in favour of a soundtrack from Philip Glass, leaving the viewer to draw their own conclusions from the imagery. Early sequences focus primarily on natural phenomenon - canyons, waterfalls and deserts in all their awe-inspiring splendour - but as the film progresses we see increasing evidence of human modification, as a new phenomenon lays claim to the landscape, the phenomenon being that of technology. The opening portions of the film are devoid of any actual first-hand signs of human life, the power lines that span the desert and the great imposing smokestacks that penetrate the skies initially doing all the talking for us. As we wade deeper into urbanisation, however, we discover where all the humans are at - playing Q*bert and getting daily slices of nutrition in shopping mall food courts. The sequence is masterfully shot and edited so as to inspire a tangle of contradictory responses; at once beautiful and nightmarish, the imagery speaking of both the potency and vulnerabilities of humankind, the might of species matched with the powerlessness of the individual. The rows and rows of supermarket shelves stocked with goods and the numerous venues competing for patrons' attentions in a shopping mall give off the appearance of choice in an overall arena of entrapment. Reggio himself has commented that the purpose of the film was to illustrate how: "The main event today is not seen by those of us who live in it...the transiting from old nature, or the natural environment as our host of life for human habitation, into a technological milieu, into mass technology as the environment of life...it's not that we use technology, it's that we live technology. Technology has become as ubiquitous as the air we breathe, so we're no longer conscious of its presence."

The journey we undertake in Koyaanisqatsi is effectively that out of Eden and into the Tower of Babel (an image evoked more explicitly in the second of its spiritual sequels, Naqoyqatsi), a Babel that seems to be simultaneously ascending into ever more dizzying heights while erupting into a borderline apocalyptic chaos. There is a universal language being spoken around this tower - one that urges its denizens onto a course of constant consumption - yet it comes from such a multitude of ceaselessly jabbering voices as to amount to an all-out sensory overload, an idea most effectively communicated in one shot where we see a woman and her two children in an electronics store, surrounded by walls of television screens all transmitting the exact same image. This is followed by a channel-surfing sequence in which we surge through multiple television images with the same kind of feverish frenzy as those aforementioned overpass shot, digesting brief extracts from news broadcasts and commercials; too brief to have much individual meaning, but which all ad up to convey a single, entirely comprehensible message that seems to arise from a state of total delirium. Possibly my favourite shot in The Grid is that in which we pan down through the various levels of a shopping mall, a massive complex of criss-crossing escalators, artificial lighting and the occasional desperately out of place greenery; throughout this shot I find myself caught between marvelling at the architecture and the claustrophobic sensation that I'm navigating my way through some kind of maze that's leading me further and further away from the prospect of ever seeing daylight again. In fact, that's my overall impression of life in The Grid - the denizens all appear to be navigating through a giant maze comprised of endless, snake-like passages, all racing toward some kind of objective that none of them seem to be achieving. It is a maze in which all the inhabitants seem to be perpetually lost. Throughout much the footage, the humans are too numerous and too indistinct for any particular one to stand out, but every now and then you get some sense of the individual lives adrift in the system, and micro-narratives start to suggest themselves - I'm quite fond of one shot that seems to function as a split-screen, showing a lone office worker through the window of a skyscraper while crowds and traffic whizz by on the streets below. Likewise, a moment in which we follow an individual woman through an unusually deserted subway seems almost startling when juxtaposed with so much congestion.

The opening of Bedazzled thrives on similar shots depicting masses of humans racing through a plethora of streets and subways. In lieu of Glass's haunting score these shots are unaccompanied by Johnnie Taylor's "Just The One (I've Been Looking For)", cluing us in that we're in for a more comical look at the notion of urban indifference. Here, the Devil has the ability to freeze and identify individuals among the non-stop sprawl by a range of defining characteristics - she can pick out a "sinner" from a "saint", and a "peeping tom", "fake" and "optimist" who all happen to cross paths on their daily commute. There are a few obvious jokes, such as the so-called environmentalist who negligently disposes of a paper cup, the bridge and groom who are tying the knot "for money" and "for green card" respectively, and the "ex-yuppie" who seems to regard a passing "ex-hippie" with an instinctual antipathy. For many of the subjects, however, the labels seem merely absurd in their arbitrariness. The "virgin" seems indistinguishable from the "horny", while our aforementioned fake, peeping tom and optimist barely register as distinct figures. Ostensibly, these are labels which evoke the kind of micro-narratives intermittently suggested in The Grid sequence of Koyaanisqatsi, and the contradictions and general human messiness underpinning this seemingly formidable surge of global conquest. They take on a more sinister edge, however, when we consider that the particular perspective from which we are seeing the world is that of the Devil's own personal shopping channel. The labels which supposedly define each individual therein basically amount to advertising hooks designed to talk up each unwitting soul to a consumer hell-bent on bending them to her own ends.

On one level, the Koyaanisqatsi nods in Bedazzled function as an elaborate set-up to a visual punchline that occurs at the very end of the opening sequence, when Elliot gets stuck holding the door at the Synedyne building (or Syn for short - get it?) for a seemingly endless succession of visitors. The image is indicative of the disconnect between Elliot and his environs, the idea that he's a lost soul struggling to navigate the particular grid he inhabits - he is left standing out in the cold (literally and figuratively) while the rest of the world rushes him by, apparently knowing exactly where it needs to be (unbeknownst to Elliot, this disconnect is universal across Babel, where nobody speaks exactly the same tongue, although everyone is ultimately pushing toward more-or-less the same ends). It also confirms that he has the all-important quality the Devil desires in her next victim - he is a "doormat". Other characteristics that make Elliot an appealing target for Faustian trade include "lovesick", "desperate", "oblivious" and "loser". The one characteristic that is not cited, but is implicit amid the rest is "hungry". The Devil hones in on Elliot because he is especially deficient on the satiation front. Elliot is in a constant state of hungering for the life he feels he's missing out on. He hungers for success, and he hungers for acceptance among his peers. Primarily he hungers for Alison, who represents the peak of Elliot's desires, and what ultimately convinces him to make his pact with the Devil. On another, more visceral level he hungers for something as deceptively basic as a Happy Meal, and even that yearning turns against him.

Elliott's first wish is his most mundane - he wishes for a Big Mac and a Coke, and this the Devil fulfils by taking him on a bus ride to the nearest McDonald's and ordering the requested items, which she forces him to pay for out of his own pocket. This is an underhanded tactic on the part of the Devil, who seeks to create ambiguity as to whether or not she has officially fulfilled a wish for Elliot, thus misleading him into thinking he has more wishes remaining than he does. But there is nevertheless an implicit teaching in this episode that the Devil even goes so far as to spell out for Elliot, when he complains about being expected to pay for his Big Mac: "There's no such thing as a free lunch." Only marginally more subtle is the implicit message when Elliot holds up his ill-gotten (or not) meal and declares (albeit sarcastically): "This is really the work of the Devil". Indeed, there is a connection to be made between the culture of mass consumption embodied in that mundane Big Mac and the kind of life tipped way out of balance in which the Devil is clearly most her element. The Devil reminds Elliot that there is a hidden cost to convenience, a message likewise nestled not far below the surface of Koyaanisqatsi. Reggio's film conveys the stark warning that as we immure ourselves in a self-made maze constructed from wall-to-wall television sets, overpasses and shopping malls, we risk losing touch with the bigger picture, and with the world that flounders beneath the weight of our technological addictions. Juxtaposed with all the imagery of consumption within The Grid are odes to the industrial processes that go largely hidden to the average consumer, but which make our diets of confectionery and auto-mobiles possible; these too are marvels in their adroitness, co-ordination and efficiency, and yet there is something unnerving, even unappetising about these mass production sequences. They are reminders of how much of the journey from raw resource to recognisable product happens out of sight, the momentary glimpses we get here barely scratching the surface, to say nothing of the deeper scratches extending far across the landscapes beyond the city as a result of our gargantuan appetites. The fast food ordered by Elliot is the perfect symbol for the kind of on-demand gratification most of us are accustomed to seeing materialise out of nowhere, divorced from the bigger picture, but to which a multitude of visible strings are firmly attached. The cycle of craving and consumption that defines life in The Grid is echoed in the business model by the Devil operates, for both thrive on keeping their subjects mired in a state of constant desperate yearning for on-demand gratification, all while mounting toward increasingly apocalyptic consequences. Elliot risks losing his soul, not merely in the Faustian sense, but to the perpetual feelings of inadequacy and dissatisfaction on which both corporations and the Princess of Darkness depend.

As I say, the wishes themselves are the least interesting aspect of the film. Only the first wish (for a Big Mac) and the seventh wish have any real impact on the overarching narrative, and in between we get to see him expend his five wishes on living out cliched and easily corruptible scenarios that represent conventional models of success - Elliot wishes for various incarnations of wealth, power and fame, only to discover that each comes with an unpleasant sting in the tail. So, let's skip directly to the ending, and it's somewhat of an odd one. It's an ending that effectively looks to have it both ways, in that Elliot both does and doesn't get what he wants. During his final encounter with the Devil, she advises him that Heaven is a place on Earth, as is Hell, and whichever one he inhabits ultimately comes down to his own perspective on life. Elliot discovers that what anchors him to the latter is personal desire; when he uses his final wish exclusively for Alison's benefit and not his own, he finds that his Faustian contract is voided, an outcome that makes the Devil curiously happy, as if she has been privately rooting for Elliot all along. Elliot accepts that Alison is unattainable - once he actually gets close enough to strike up a conversation with the woman, he discovers that she's already in a relationship. He does, however, end up with a mirror version of Alison, one who seems custom-designed to be his perfect partner; after his adventure, Elliot returns to his house to discover a new neighbour moving in the form of Nicole (also O'Connor), and the two of them hit it off. The best sense I can make of this ending is that Nicole's uncanny appearance is intended to clue us in that Elliot has finally made it to Heaven, having transcended his previously hellish existence, with Nicole representing the angelic counterpart to the corruptive Alison. Not that there was anything particularly sordid about Alison in herself. We spend nearly all of the picture viewing her through Elliot's distorted lens and barely get to know her as a character. And that's because she barely is a character. Rather, she represents the worst of Elliot's desires, the personification of the life that was forever out of his reach, and without which he'd convinced himself his existence was inherently debased. Nicole, on the other hand, is the embodiment of self-acceptance - she looks like Alison, but her personality more closely echoes Elliot's own, thus affirming that there was validity in the person he has been all along.

In the film's closing sequence, we slip back into Koyaanisqatsi mode, in a manner that deliberately echoes the opening moment in which Elliot was stuck holding the door for a stream of passers-by. Once again, time-lapse photography shows a succession of figures zipping across the local terrain while Elliot, along with Nicole, stays comparatively still. This time, though, there's not so much a sense of Elliot being lost and passed over in the daily grind as him having figured out exactly where he wants to be - which is to say, right there in the present moment - while the rest of the world races ever onward in the expectation of some vaguely defined better. Elliot and Nicole are not the only figures left out of the general scramble - we also see a Buddhist monk sitting upon a park bench, two more couples and a family - a minority of figures who appear to have stepped out of Babel and achieved something resembling clarity. We see that Elliot is still being observed by both God and the Devil, who are playing a game of chess together in the park; the ancient battle between virtue and vice continues, but in a much more amicable fashion than traditionally assumed. For the final frame, we close in on our two heavenly souls and get a glimpse of what life is like on the side of the angels - Nicole "hogs the covers" while Elliot "drinks from the carton." Heaven, much like Hell/Babel, is signified by the uncouth habits and all-round messiness that make up each individual therein, and here that's embraced as as good as it gets.