The Witches of Eastwick

The Witches of Eastwick is one of those movies that wants you to think it’s telling a feminist story about powerful women when it’s really all about a man. As Miranda said in Sex and the City: “How did it happen that four such smart women have nothing to talk about but boyfriends?” In this case, there are three smart women played by Cher, Susan Sarandon, and Michelle Pfeiffer. They live in a boring small town, have between zero and six kids, and all of their husbands are either dead or gone. They deal with sexual harassment and condescending men and get together weekly to drink cocktails and complain about not being able to find decent men. Then they accidentally conjure a man of their dreams, who turns out to be a greasy, chubby, ponytailed Jack Nicholson. Despite starring three of the most fabulous, talented actresses, the movie barely even passes the Bechdel test.

Cher plays a single mother and artist who makes fertility statues out of clay. Pfeiffer has six little blonde kids and works at the local newspaper. Sarandon is a cellist and band director whose boss grabs her butt in front of the students and suggests he’ll promote her if she sleeps with him. Before director George Miller started filming, Cher decided that she wanted the role originally intended for Sarandon and switched parts without telling her. This is fitting, since these three characters are so interchangeable the actresses could’ve played any of them.

When the three women are forced to endure Sarandon’s sexist pig boss giving a speech to the town that’s so boring, kids fall asleep and adults zone out, they each daydream about a storm rolling in and ending their torture, and then they actually manifest it. Later, at their Thursday night drink and bitch session, they realize they have powers when they’re together. After remembering all the lousy men they’ve dated, they talk about their ideal man, “a tall, dark prince traveling under a curse,” and make Goldilocks comments about his dick size: not too big, not too small, just right. Cher says, “I don’t think that men are the answer to everything,” and Sarandon, just like Miranda in Sex and the City, points out, “Then why do we always end up talking about them?”

Summoned, Jack Nicholson rolls into town. He buys the town’s huge spooky mansion; disrupts Sarandon’s string quartet concert by snoring, falling out of his chair, and then clapping obnoxiously loudly; and magically causes the town busybody Vanessa Cartwright to fall down the stairs and break her leg. From this point on, the movie isn’t concerned with the three women trying to get respect. It becomes the Jack show.

Now it’s time for Nicholson to start seducing the three women using second wave feminism tropes. Cher, whose fertility statues he calls “little booby dolls,” is unimpressed by him, calling him unattractive and smelly while he slinks around on his bed in a silk robe, waggling his eyebrows and calling himself, “Just your average horny little devil.” But after he tells her she hasn’t been fulfilled in her roles as wife, mother, or neighbor and that she’s meant for something better, she kisses him.

He knocks on the front door of Sarandon, whose hand is bleeding from practicing the cello so much. Sensing that she thinks her musical talents aren’t appreciated, he tells her the witches that were burned were actually female midwives pushed out of the medical profession by male doctors who didn’t want the competition and says, “Men are such cocksuckers, aren’t they?” Then he kneels in front of her, pushes her knees apart, puts her cello there, and encourages her to play with more passion. As she plays, her hair falls out of her tight braid, smoke comes out of her cello, and she gets into a sexual frenzy. She drops the cello, which catches on fire, and jumps on him.

Pfeiffer gets the ickiest hard sell. Knowing that he’s already slept with her friends, she warns him that she gets pregnant all the time. He’s all eyebrows as he claims he wishes he was a woman because they can make babies and feed them with their bodies. Somehow this works on her.

It’s implied that by sleeping with these women, Nicholson has unlocked their full potential. They’re suddenly tranquil and liberated, wearing sexy clothes and with hair that’s grown into enormous piles of ‘80s curls. They spend all their time at the mansion, playing tennis by moving the ball with their thoughts, flying above the pool, and lounging in front of the fireplace, talking about their greatest fears. Sarandon fears getting older, Cher doesn’t like snakes, and Pfeiffer is afraid of pain.

But people in town don’t approve of their new big hair and give no fucks attitudes. Rumors spread, women in the grocery store call them sluts, and busybody Cartwright rants about them in church, yelling, “Incest! Spanish flies! Dildos! Anal intercourse!” Nicholson encourages the women to eat an enormous bowl of cherries, which causes Cartwright to vomit cherry pits as she’s raving about them to her husband and aggressively rubbing her crotch. Fed up, her husband picks up a fire poker and kills her offscreen.

When the women find out about the murder, they feel responsible and decide to stop seeing Nicholson. They also discover that he got them all pregnant. Furious at their rejection, Nicholson takes revenge by using their fears against them: Sarandon ages rapidly, Cher wakes up in a bed full of snakes, and Pfeiffer is hospitalized with debilitating pain. When he’s told no, he turns violent and weaponizes the women’s vulnerabilities.

Cher confronts Nicholson at the mansion, but he doesn’t care about the murder or the pain he’s caused the women. He goes full Jack Torrance, throwing things and telling her he loves them. She tells him he doesn’t know what love is, so he insists, “I could learn. You could teach me. How hard can it be?” Patriarchy outsources men’s emotional development to women.

Pfeiffer’s pain suddenly stops. The three women return to the mansion and lounge around in Nicholson’s bed, looking like the Brides of Dracula. The next morning, they send him to the store for food to fulfill their pregnancy cravings, blowing him kisses from the window. As soon as he’s gone, they make a voodoo doll from wax and his hair and chant from a spell book. They poke the doll with needles and Nicholson jerks around violently. They blow feathers at it and Nicholson’s caught in a huge, feathery windstorm. He runs into a church for safety and shouts at the congregation about how women are one of God’s mistakes along with tidal waves, earthquakes, and floods, but the three women eat cherries, so he spews cherry pits during his rant. He’s completely mask off now: a grotesque man who sexually desires and despises women.

When Nicholson gets back to the mansion, he’s covered in feathers and looks demonic. The women toss the voodoo doll back and forth until it shatters on the floor. He transforms into a massive monster and attacks them. When they throw the voodoo doll into the fire, he collapses into a tiny deformed monster stalk that glares at them before popping out of existence. His power disappears when the women act together; patriarchy survives by keeping women apart.

Eighteen months later, each woman has a baby boy with her own hair color: black, red, and blonde. The babies adorably waddle to the TV, where Nicholson appears, coaxing them to “Come to daddy.” The women see him, smirk, and turn off the TV.

In a movie that’s supposedly about female power, starring three of the most unique, talented, and gorgeous actresses ever, these women spend most of their time talking about schlubby, horny Jack Nicholson as he waggles his eyebrows and throws temper tantrums. If it passes the Bechdel test, it’s just barely. Their conversations are about their past relationships with men, their desire for new men, and their problems with this man. The movie is also crass, vulgar, and dumb, packed full of dick jokes and cherry puke. Despite how much enjoyment these actors have given me over the years, it’s impressive that George Miller managed to make them so dull together. The movie wants to be seen as feminist, but its ideas are shallow and broad and the narrative is centered on a man. The result is a frustrating, unenjoyable mess that feels like wasted potential.

VERDICT: GUILTY