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Now playing: PRACTICAL MAGIC 2 (2026)
Practically unwatchable
Practical Magic 2: My kingdom for a busted bumbershoot!
PRACTICAL MAGIC 2 (2026) Susanne Bier / Writers: Akiva Goldsman, Georgia Pritchett, & Kelly Marcel from the Novel The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman / Cinematographer: Simon Duggan (2.35:1) / Design: Tom Burton / Editor: Sam Williams / Composer: Rupert Gregson-Williams / Acted by: Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Dianne Wiest, Stockard Channing, Lee Pace, Maisie Williams, Joey King, Xolo Maridueña, and Solly McLeod / USA / Warner Bros. / Rated PG-13 / Length: 130 mins.
Schmaltzy, death-plagued, structurally infirmed, and at one point unduly violent, Practical Magic 2 is a far-from-frothy way to fritter away 130 minutes of one’s life at the movies. The original Practical Magic was pitched to audiences as an occultist sisterly comedy, but at its core, the story was founded on domestic abuse. Despite this, while hints of a darker side were dangled before us, any chance of PM1 director Griffin Dunne exploring the film’s gloomier shades of thaumaturgy and intra-family violence were amputated by a frightened studio eager to err on the side of jollity.
One actually wishes that director Susanne Bier (Love is All You Need, After the Wedding) had followed in the footsteps of her predecessor. Because it quickly becomes apparent that she’s lacking in the virtuosity needed to overcome the bathos inherent in the script.
Aunt Franny (Stockard Channing) and Aunt Jet (Dianne Wiest) are no longer viewed by the community as eccentric spell-casters living in a whimsical mansion on the New England coast. The once fearful neighbors now embrace the sisters, waiting at the gate and hoping for an audience with these modern-day faith healers.
Let us pause for a moment to reflect on the film’s Stevie Nicks connection: the dresses that Jet and Franny wear are clearly patterned after Nicks’ “witchy queen” flowing chiffons. So I suppose it’s only natural that this time around they include her song Landslide — perhaps in ference to the positioning of the cliffside Victorian-style mansion.
Video:
Trailer: PRACTICAL MAGIC 2
This time around with the sisterhood of the traveling chants finds Sally (Sandra Bullock) pretty much the same, thanks in large part to the actresses’ well-established status as America’s maladroit sweetheart. When all else fails, she sputters, mumbles, and fidgets her way out of any given situation.
Gillian Owens (Nicole Kidman), her unrestrained sister, once lived a bohemian lifestyle that frequently had a way of coming back to bite her — as evidenced by an abusive romantic relationship. But this time around, she’s been effectively neutered. In the first installment, Gillian practically chain-smoked her way through the film, possibly to underscore her standing as a wild child,. This time, not one puff passes her lips. Perhaps they were trying to charm away the dark magic of an R rating.
As with any lumbering contemporary studio rehash, elements from the original get re-used, with minor variations. A dialogue scene played in bed between Sally and Gillian is restaged, this time with Antonia and Kylie conversing under the covers. Instead of piercing a dove’s chest, maleficent Tom Lockland (Solly McLeod) spears a needle through Kylie’s heart. The mechanical clicks of the Death Watch beetle sound the alarm that lethality lurks around the corner.
Here, it's Sally and her oldest daughter Kylie (Joey King) who keep bearing the family curse that witches and romance don’t mix, and that any male who dares fall in love with an Owens girl won’t live to see the closing credits. Sure enough, no sooner does Kylie profess love for her boyfriend Gideon (Xolo Maridueña) than a traffic accident renders him comatose in a hospital bed.
Kylie, guided by visions — fiendishly flickering monochrome flashbacks, intended to up the film’s creep factor, that instead conspicuously draw attention to what appear to be outtakes from The Lighthouse — hops a plane to London in search of a way to lift the curse. Antonia (Maisie Williams), Sally’s youngest, is a nurse who remains stateside, on call whenever the script clumsily cuts away from the action to perform a bed check and make sure Gideon remains somnolent.
Sally and Gillian soon follow, the former falling for Ian Wright (Lee Pace), a professor with more tattoos than Max Cady and a PhD in hocus-pocus-dominocus. It’s about this time that ugliness rears its head in the form of Lockland, a boorish brute who at first appears as a kindly conduit between Kylie and her task of cracking the curse. What would a feminist fable be without Lockland placing Kylie in a headlock before introducing her forehead to a brick wall. From there on in, the final half-hour feels longer than Berlin Alexanderplatz.
As unnecessary remakes go, PM2 is as unessential as they get. When it came time for the obligatory donning of candy cane stockings and the climactic rooftop leap, the only thing left to root for was the possibility of a faulty umbrella.
Rating: Zero Stars
Here's something you might be interested in.
Now playing: PRACTICAL MAGIC 2 (2026)
Practically unwatchable
Now playing: PRACTICAL MAGIC 2 (2026)
Practically unwatchable
Practical Magic 2: My kingdom for a busted bumbershoot!
PRACTICAL MAGIC 2 (2026) Susanne Bier / Writers: Akiva Goldsman, Georgia Pritchett, & Kelly Marcel from the Novel The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman / Cinematographer: Simon Duggan (2.35:1) / Design: Tom Burton / Editor: Sam Williams / Composer: Rupert Gregson-Williams / Acted by: Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Dianne Wiest, Stockard Channing, Lee Pace, Maisie Williams, Joey King, Xolo Maridueña, and Solly McLeod / USA / Warner Bros. / Rated PG-13 / Length: 130 mins.
Schmaltzy, death-plagued, structurally infirmed, and at one point unduly violent, Practical Magic 2 is a far-from-frothy way to fritter away 130 minutes of one’s life at the movies. The original Practical Magic was pitched to audiences as an occultist sisterly comedy, but at its core, the story was founded on domestic abuse. Despite this, while hints of a darker side were dangled before us, any chance of PM1 director Griffin Dunne exploring the film’s gloomier shades of thaumaturgy and intra-family violence were amputated by a frightened studio eager to err on the side of jollity.
One actually wishes that director Susanne Bier (Love is All You Need, After the Wedding) had followed in the footsteps of her predecessor. Because it quickly becomes apparent that she’s lacking in the virtuosity needed to overcome the bathos inherent in the script.
Aunt Franny (Stockard Channing) and Aunt Jet (Dianne Wiest) are no longer viewed by the community as eccentric spell-casters living in a whimsical mansion on the New England coast. The once fearful neighbors now embrace the sisters, waiting at the gate and hoping for an audience with these modern-day faith healers.
Let us pause for a moment to reflect on the film’s Stevie Nicks connection: the dresses that Jet and Franny wear are clearly patterned after Nicks’ “witchy queen” flowing chiffons. So I suppose it’s only natural that this time around they include her song Landslide — perhaps in ference to the positioning of the cliffside Victorian-style mansion.
Video:
Trailer: PRACTICAL MAGIC 2
This time around with the sisterhood of the traveling chants finds Sally (Sandra Bullock) pretty much the same, thanks in large part to the actresses’ well-established status as America’s maladroit sweetheart. When all else fails, she sputters, mumbles, and fidgets her way out of any given situation.
Gillian Owens (Nicole Kidman), her unrestrained sister, once lived a bohemian lifestyle that frequently had a way of coming back to bite her — as evidenced by an abusive romantic relationship. But this time around, she’s been effectively neutered. In the first installment, Gillian practically chain-smoked her way through the film, possibly to underscore her standing as a wild child,. This time, not one puff passes her lips. Perhaps they were trying to charm away the dark magic of an R rating.
As with any lumbering contemporary studio rehash, elements from the original get re-used, with minor variations. A dialogue scene played in bed between Sally and Gillian is restaged, this time with Antonia and Kylie conversing under the covers. Instead of piercing a dove’s chest, maleficent Tom Lockland (Solly McLeod) spears a needle through Kylie’s heart. The mechanical clicks of the Death Watch beetle sound the alarm that lethality lurks around the corner.
Here, it's Sally and her oldest daughter Kylie (Joey King) who keep bearing the family curse that witches and romance don’t mix, and that any male who dares fall in love with an Owens girl won’t live to see the closing credits. Sure enough, no sooner does Kylie profess love for her boyfriend Gideon (Xolo Maridueña) than a traffic accident renders him comatose in a hospital bed.
Kylie, guided by visions — fiendishly flickering monochrome flashbacks, intended to up the film’s creep factor, that instead conspicuously draw attention to what appear to be outtakes from The Lighthouse — hops a plane to London in search of a way to lift the curse. Antonia (Maisie Williams), Sally’s youngest, is a nurse who remains stateside, on call whenever the script clumsily cuts away from the action to perform a bed check and make sure Gideon remains somnolent.
Sally and Gillian soon follow, the former falling for Ian Wright (Lee Pace), a professor with more tattoos than Max Cady and a PhD in hocus-pocus-dominocus. It’s about this time that ugliness rears its head in the form of Lockland, a boorish brute who at first appears as a kindly conduit between Kylie and her task of cracking the curse. What would a feminist fable be without Lockland placing Kylie in a headlock before introducing her forehead to a brick wall. From there on in, the final half-hour feels longer than Berlin Alexanderplatz.
As unnecessary remakes go, PM2 is as unessential as they get. When it came time for the obligatory donning of candy cane stockings and the climactic rooftop leap, the only thing left to root for was the possibility of a faulty umbrella.
Rating: Zero Stars