MOVIE REVIEWS : Shelley Long Breathes Life, Humor Into ‘Hello Again’

“Hello Again,” a typically bright and shiny Touchstone comedy, would have us believe that you could raise a person from the dead if : (1) the individual died before his or her time; (2) you felt pure love for the deceased, and (3) the Earth, the moon and the Dog star are aligned in a perfect isosceles triangle.

The persuasiveness of “Hello Again” has, of course, nothing to do with such deliberately jokey hocus-pocus, but it does have everything to do with the adorably amusing Shelley Long. It’s commonplace to say that the star system is dead, but the current crop of films strongly suggests otherwise. Consider Diane Keaton in “Baby Boom,” Nick Nolte in “Weeds,” Sally Field and Michael Caine in “Surrender,” Dudley Moore in “Like Father, Like Son” and Cher and Dennis Quaid in “Suspect.” As with “Hello Again,” whatever degree of credibility these films possess lies not in their stories but in their stars having been cast in roles tailored beautifully to their personalities. It’s enough to make you wonder if you’re not caught up in a Hollywood time warp.

Long is Lucy Chadman, the wife of a Long Island plastic surgeon (Corbin Bernsen) who’s in line to become the chief of his department at a Manhattan hospital. Lucy is a spunky, outgoing, suburban housewife who dresses demurely and whose natural klutziness is intensified when she accompanies her husband, Jason, in his high-powered socializing.

But soon after she has had to rescue her skirt from around her ankles and spilled her soup at an excruciatingly posh party, she chokes to death on a Korean chicken ball while visiting her zany spiritualist sister, Zelda (Judith Ivey), at her occult book shop in SoHo. On the first anniversary of Lucy’s death, Zelda is determined to try to bring Lucy back to life.

Director Frank Perry and writer Susan Isaacs, who previously collaborated on the similarly satirical “Compromising Positions,” clearly owe a certain debt to “Blithe Spirit.” But they’ve made their task harder: Lucy, upon her return, is no ghost. Everybody can see her, which is just what Jason, who has married Lucy’s glamorous gold-digging pal Kim (Sela Ward), is afraid of.

Perry and Isaacs discover both poignancy and fun in Lucy’s plight, and they really let Jason squirm. He’s afraid Lucy’s return is going to wreck everything for him, yet he has already found that the sexy, slinky Kim’s “living life on a broader canvas” has translated rapidly into bigger spending.

The film makers get in some nifty digs into social climbers and shallow yuppie values while catching up Lucy in romance and adventure. You can be sure that the last person she gazed upon before dying, a handsome Irish doctor (Gabriel Byrne), will loom large in her new life.

There are assaults on logic right and left, but it matters little, for Shelley Long is an irresistible charmer. She has the kind of wit, femininity and straightforwardness that makes her the perfect foil for screwball comedy, much like Irene Dunne in the ‘30s. Yet she is so contemporary that she can take a classic pratfall and make you forget that everybody from Chaplin to Lucille Ball has done it.

As in “Compromising Positions,” Ivey’s zest adds immeasurably to the fun, and Bernsen, the “L.A. Law” star in his first major screen role, brings out all the humor in the foolish Jason’s various changes of heart. (A deft, subtle touch: We’re allowed to see in retrospect that Jason’s seeming acceptance of the calamity-prone Lucy and her conservative wardrobe was really indifference on his part.)

Not surprisingly, “Hello Again” has the sleek Touchstone look, thanks to production designer Edward Pisoni, costume designer Ruth Morley and cinematographer Jan Weinckes. (When it comes to the ultimate in chic decor and trendy life styles of the ‘80s, Touchstone productions are films for the time capsule.) “Hello Again” (MPAA-rated PG) is but a souffle, yet it has taken considerable--and commendable--artistry in keeping it light and airy.