The Devil & Daniel Webster
November 2003 Reviewed by: Rad Bennett Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

Can it be? This movie was made the year I was born -- and it seems dated. But Citizen Kane was also made in 1941 and still seems bold, innovative, vital, and alive. I hope that my life follows the latter example!

Though of the past, The Devil & Daniel Webster is not without its delicious charms. Based on a folk tale by Stephen Vincent Benét, it chronicles the great orator’s imaginary courtroom encounter with the Devil in front of a jury of pirates and thugs. Though he was apparently quite formidable in real life, Benét paints Webster as even larger than that.

The story starts when honest, hardworking New Hampshire farmer Jabez Stone has had "one of those days." Everything seems to have gone wrong, and in desperation, rather than praying to God, he cries that he would sell his soul to the Devil in order to have things go right. Enter Walter Huston, one of the best Devils in film history. Since this story is set in New England, he is called Mr. Scratch, and he can perform many wonders, such as setting pieces of paper on fire, and making crocks of gold appear in Stone’s barn!

Thanks to Scratch, Stone becomes wealthy and forgets his humble origins. To make sure Stone stays on the path to hell, Scratch sends Belle, a voluptuous vixen, to be his housekeeper. Under her tutelage, Stone is soon having poker games in the house while his wife is away at church! Though it could not be shown in 1941, it is also implied that Stone sometimes cohabits Belle’s bed. After the requisite seven years, Scratch comes for Stone’s soul, but Daniel Webster aids him, arguing his case in front of the aforementioned evil courtroom.

Edward Arnold is blustery and commanding as Stone, though I kept wondering what George C. Scott might have done with this role, had he been the right age at the time the film was made. The rest of the cast is inarguably perfect. Simone Simon is kittenish and coy, yet oh so evil, as Belle. Jane Darwell is stalwart and pious as Ma Stone, and Anne Shirley offers innocence and salvation aplenty as Stone’s wife Mary.

The video transfer is good, though not a complete restoration. There is still some flicker, and certain scenes seem to lack enough contrast. Don’t expect to see the kind of dynamic transfer afforded Citizen Kane by Warner, and you won’t be too disappointed. The sound is another matter. One of the best things about this movie is Bernard Herrmann’s Academy Award-winning score. The composer arranged the best music into an orchestral suite a year after the movie’s release, and it has been recorded repeatedly in splendid sound. Herrmann himself conducted the suite for London Phase 4, and James Sedares and the New Zealand Symphony have even more recently recorded it in state-of-the-art digital sound. The soundtrack here cannot begin to compare. Even by optical soundtrack standards of the day, it is simply not so hot. There are times when one can barely make out the score. I hasten to add that the soundtrack does adequate justice to all of the dialogue.

As usual for its releases, Criterion has provided some interesting extras. Alec Baldwin reads the original story, and Christopher Husted of Herrmann’s estate presents an essay on Herrmann’s music. There are good still-frame galleries; Columbia Workshop radio dramatizations of this story; and another Webster tale, Daniel Webster & the Sea Serpent. Most important of all, there is crackling good audio commentary by film historian Bruce Eder and Herrmann biographer Steven C. Smith.

As I have been writing this, I have chuckled from time to time, remembering some choice scenes in this movie. Though perhaps dated, it contains timeless whimsy and humor. So thinking on it again, I would like my life to follow Kane with a touch of the Devil in it.

• Go Back