Peter Cook and Dudley Moore were one of Britain's leading two-man comedy teams of the sixties and seventies, but they were younger and edgier than other comedy dues of the period such as Morecambe and Wise or The Two Ronnies, often with a satirical bite to their humour. They mostly worked on television, but "Bedazzled" is one of their rare joint ventures onto the cinema screen. Moore, of course, was later to become a successful Hollywood actor, specialising in romantic comedies. American audiences, apparently, loved him, but British ones found it hard to understand his success; they tended to see him more as the hapless, none-too-bright loser he had played in his duologues with Cook than as the new Cary Grant or David Niven.
In this film, however, Moore plays another hapless loser. His character Stanley Moon is a cook in a fast-food restaurant who is infatuated with Margaret, a waitress who works in the same restaurant, but lacks the self-confidence to ask her out. (In the sixties even hamburger joints used to employ waitresses rather than requiring customers to order their food at the counter). He makes the acquaintance of George Spiggott, a nightclub owner who is really the Devil in disguise. The Devil offers Stanley seven wishes in exchange for his soul, a bargain which Stanley accepts, hoping to use his wishes to get Margaret into bed with him. The joke is that every time Stanley makes a wish, the Devil grants him something which accords with the strict letter of what he has wished for but which somehow does not give him what he really wants. Other scenes feature George's staff of the Seven Deadly Sins, most notably a scantily-dressed Raquel Welch as Lust (disguised as a go-go dancer at the nightclub).
The film is essentially a comic version of the Faust legend, set against the background of 1960s Swinging London. As one might expect of a Cook and Moore production, especially with a script written by Cook, who was generally the more acerbic of the two, it contains a good deal of social satire, especially during the "wish" scenes" when Stanley becomes, among other things, a pretentious and garrulous intellectual and a rock star. Although the rest of the film is in colour, the "rock star" scene is shot in black-and-white to mimic the look of the BBC's "Top of the Pops"- British television had not yet embraced colour- and makes Cook's disdain for pop culture quite clear. (He himself sings a monotonous, meaningless parody of a pop song). Although he would only have been thirty in 1967, he was far from being the only thirty-something around this period who looked down on pop music as trashy modern rubbish for gullible long-haired teenagers. (My own parents were around the same age and of a similar opinion).
In a comedy revolving round the subject of eternal damnation, it is inevitable that some of the satire will come at the expense of religion; in one scene Stanley finds himself transformed into a member of an order of nuns whose form of religious worship involves bouncing on a trampoline. (Despite his transformation, he retains his masculine appearance). God himself turns up as a pompous, self-satisfied disembodied voice booming down from Heaven. The film ends with the Devil threatening to take revenge on God by unleashing on the world what Cook evidently regarded as the deadly plagues of the modern age, including Tastee-Freez and Wimpy Burgers, concrete runways, motorways, aircraft, television and automobiles, advertising, plastic flowers, frozen food, and supersonic bangs. This element of religious satire may explain why the film, although a hit in Britain, was less successful in an America still unused to films which took a disrespectful attitude towards things sacred. (The Production Code had only just come to an end in 1967).
The film can inevitably come across as looking very dated today, but that is the price to be paid for satire, which needs to be directed against the foibles and preoccupations of the age in which it is made. What was edgy and biting when it first came out can seem stale even ten- sometimes even five- years later, never mind fifty-two. "Bedazzled", however, does give modern audiences a chance to see two of Britain's finest comedians going through their paces. Too many of their television performances, alas, were lost to the BBC's short-sighted "wiping" policies of the sixties and seventies. Just forget that dreadful remake with Liz Hurley. 7/10
In this film, however, Moore plays another hapless loser. His character Stanley Moon is a cook in a fast-food restaurant who is infatuated with Margaret, a waitress who works in the same restaurant, but lacks the self-confidence to ask her out. (In the sixties even hamburger joints used to employ waitresses rather than requiring customers to order their food at the counter). He makes the acquaintance of George Spiggott, a nightclub owner who is really the Devil in disguise. The Devil offers Stanley seven wishes in exchange for his soul, a bargain which Stanley accepts, hoping to use his wishes to get Margaret into bed with him. The joke is that every time Stanley makes a wish, the Devil grants him something which accords with the strict letter of what he has wished for but which somehow does not give him what he really wants. Other scenes feature George's staff of the Seven Deadly Sins, most notably a scantily-dressed Raquel Welch as Lust (disguised as a go-go dancer at the nightclub).
The film is essentially a comic version of the Faust legend, set against the background of 1960s Swinging London. As one might expect of a Cook and Moore production, especially with a script written by Cook, who was generally the more acerbic of the two, it contains a good deal of social satire, especially during the "wish" scenes" when Stanley becomes, among other things, a pretentious and garrulous intellectual and a rock star. Although the rest of the film is in colour, the "rock star" scene is shot in black-and-white to mimic the look of the BBC's "Top of the Pops"- British television had not yet embraced colour- and makes Cook's disdain for pop culture quite clear. (He himself sings a monotonous, meaningless parody of a pop song). Although he would only have been thirty in 1967, he was far from being the only thirty-something around this period who looked down on pop music as trashy modern rubbish for gullible long-haired teenagers. (My own parents were around the same age and of a similar opinion).
In a comedy revolving round the subject of eternal damnation, it is inevitable that some of the satire will come at the expense of religion; in one scene Stanley finds himself transformed into a member of an order of nuns whose form of religious worship involves bouncing on a trampoline. (Despite his transformation, he retains his masculine appearance). God himself turns up as a pompous, self-satisfied disembodied voice booming down from Heaven. The film ends with the Devil threatening to take revenge on God by unleashing on the world what Cook evidently regarded as the deadly plagues of the modern age, including Tastee-Freez and Wimpy Burgers, concrete runways, motorways, aircraft, television and automobiles, advertising, plastic flowers, frozen food, and supersonic bangs. This element of religious satire may explain why the film, although a hit in Britain, was less successful in an America still unused to films which took a disrespectful attitude towards things sacred. (The Production Code had only just come to an end in 1967).
The film can inevitably come across as looking very dated today, but that is the price to be paid for satire, which needs to be directed against the foibles and preoccupations of the age in which it is made. What was edgy and biting when it first came out can seem stale even ten- sometimes even five- years later, never mind fifty-two. "Bedazzled", however, does give modern audiences a chance to see two of Britain's finest comedians going through their paces. Too many of their television performances, alas, were lost to the BBC's short-sighted "wiping" policies of the sixties and seventies. Just forget that dreadful remake with Liz Hurley. 7/10