MOVIE REVIEW : A Bit of Seduction, Then This ‘Spell’ Goes Straight to the Devil

In “Spellbinder” (citywide), as in “Fatal Attraction,” quick sex leaves you with the devil to pay. Loose women represent fatality; they’re Lucifer’s minions.

It’s an interesting switch on a common underground delusion of the ‘70s: the idea that night and the orgy were the roads to salvation. Now, when Kelly Preston as Miranda, a limber young temptress-in-distress, begins eyeing yuppie lawyer Jeff Mills (Timothy Daly) right after they meet, you can feel the psychic caldrons hissing.

This hapless beagle-eyed legal simp, with his predilection for L.A. art and soft jazz. Doesn’t he know when he’s got it good? Doesn’t he know enough not to drag strange ladies with no address and no brassiere back to his place--especially when they have puzzlingly hot hands and a boyfriend (Anthony Crivello) who flashes knives, levitates cars and glowers like Dracula at a Van Halen concert?

Unfortunately, Preston looks like the kind of woman who could drive you to the devil. She has the supple legs and teasing laugh of a street nymph; sexuality oozes out of her like butter crannying through hot toast.

In this film’s opening seduction scene--the best thing it has to offer--director Janet Greek shows that assignations can benefit from a woman’s touch. She’s good at capturing the edgy maneuvers; the calculated touches and erotic ebb and flow.

Then the plot begins creaking into place, and the characters and the movie go to hell in short order.

There are nasty looks for Miranda from Jeff’s secretary; meaningful ones from his basketball buddy (Rick Rossovich). There are covens and corpses and satanic symbols--and Jeff’s answering machine begins to sound as if it had crossed connections to the Cave of the Winds. Obviously, this infernal triangle will reap no bliss.

The devil finds work for idle hands. Can’t he dream up something for scriptwriter Tracey Torme? This flashy satanic cult movie--Aleister Crowley in Calvin Kleins--is less sophisticated than Val Lewton’s “The Seventh Victim” of 45 years ago.

There are some good things: the neat cyclical structure, Greek’s and Preston’s knack for eroticism, Audra Lindley’s fierce performance as a mad-eyed, scornful old witch, and the genuinely spellbinding cinematography of horror expert Adam Greenberg (“The Terminator,” “Near Dark”).

But the surprise ending of “Spellbinder” (MPAA-rated R for sex, nudity, language and violence) should be no surprise; one crucial performance tips it off almost immediately.

And there’s also an absurd kung fu interlude, dotty survivalist jokes and enough satanic ceremonies to keep you worrying about the goats and the virgins. Hell, in this case, hath no fury, and often no point either.