31 Days Of Horror: Day #15 - CANDYMAN

"It was always you, Helen." - The Candyman

 

Candyman, (1992), Directed by Bernard Rose

Grade: A 

About as far away from the song that became Sammy Davis Jr.'s trademark, Candyman is a traditional full-blown horror flick. Penned by Clive Barker from his short story "The Forbidden", the film deals with an urban legend that spills over into reality, and the horrifying consequences that ensue.

The always lovely Virginia Madsen plays Helen, a graduate student that begins a study on local urban myths and legends.  Her research leads her to the story of Candyman, an artist who was a plantation slave's son that was rebelled against by locals, and was killed in a bizarre death ritual which resulted in his hand being replaced with a hook.  The legend involves saying his name five times while looking in a mirror and he will appear to enact revenge, usually resulting in the death of whoever has summoned him.

What follows is the definition of a horror film.  All the elements are here: blood, gore, violence, screams, and some of the best music ever written for a horror movie by Classicist composer Philip Glass.   The movie prides itself by not bowing to the usual horror cliches and becoming another "dead teenager movie" (Thank you, Roger Ebert for that terminology). 

I saw this movie in the theater, and I remember the impact of hearing Philip Glass' music blasting away throughout the film and how it actually BECAME part of the story. It was an actual character in the film. Most likely, Candyman would not have been nearly as effective without it, as evidenced in this track which still invokes chills whenever I hear it:



The film spawned two lame-ass sequels, which were a huge insult to the original, but as always in the movies, especially in the horror genre, building a franchise is always a hopeful for the producers.  New Line Cinema wouldn't even EXIST today if it wasn't for Freddy Krueger, and sadly....Lionsgate might still be a low-end indie production company if it wasn't for that idiot Jigsaw.

But whatever, I highly recommend Candyman.  It's a great horror film that stays with you and taps deep into the emotional psyche, and the direction and production values are first-rate, along with Tony Todd giving the performance that would make him famous among the horror community.

And I shall now end this post with the most cliched, boring, and most over-used line that any film critic says when giving his positive review of a horror movie:

"Watch this one alone at night with the lights out."

Ugh. That's all I could come up with?  Not too sweet.