296.
Candyman
6/10
The Candyman franchise never really hit the heights like Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween and Friday the 13th, but it wasn't through a lack of trying. Tony Todd is famous for his role as the Candyman during the 90s' and it's time to revive the franchise with a sequel to the 1992 movie. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II fresh off some success as Manta from the Aquaman movie leads the way in a movie written by Jordan Peele who has taken the horror genre in a new direction over the past decade. In my eyes, some of Peele's have been hits, some misses but this one is directed by Nia DaCosta who is new to me. Yet another movie which was delayed significantly, I am always ready for a horror movie, no matter the time of year that it hits the screen. With a new age of horror fans, it'll be interesting to see how they look to revive the story and hook the audience.
The movie begins with a little back story, taking us back to the 70s' and the police searching for a homeless man with a hook for a hand. He was suspected of putting razor blades in candy that ended up in the hands of a white girl over Halloween. Sherman Fields then offers move candy to a lad in the laundry room at the base of a block of flats. The kid is scared of this hook-handed man and screams, alerting the police who then beat the man to death. Two weeks later he is declared innocent after all as more razor blades show up.
42 years later and we meet our main character Anthony McCoy, played by Yahya. McCoy is an artist, living in Chicago with his art gallery director girlfriend Brianna. McCoy ahs been struggling for a vision recently and no better way is there to find one by a legend of gruesome events. He's told the story of a girl who went on a killing spree before kidnapping a baby, offering it as sacrifice. The situation escalated further as she tried to jump into a bonfire with the child, who was rescued, but the woman perished.
Finally McCoy has the full inspiration that he needs, creating a piece named 'Say My Name' to display at his girlfriend's exhibit. The painting is shunned by almost everyone and McCoy storms off in a drunken rage. That night, a critic and his girlfriend are killed gruesomely after saying Candyman whilst Anthony McCoy is at home compulsively painting unknown portraits. He becomes more and more obsessed with the legend of the Candyman, finding it relates back over a hundred years to a black man who was killed for having an interracial relationship. The legend then lives on through each murdered black, who all form a hive for the Candyman. The faces are the faces of Anthony's portraits. More and more people hear of the legend and begin to summon the Candyman. As this continues, Anthony realises that he is starting to transform as a bee sting starts to spread across his body. He heads to the hospital for treatment and on giving his information, he realises that his mother lied about his past. He was the baby saved from the bonfire in the 70s'. He finds out from his mother that the Candyman was responsible for the killings all those years ago and he was planned to be sacrificed too. The community declared that they would hide the events and the legend as best they could but now Anthony is totally blown away, wondering through the abandoned area of Cabrini-Green, where the events took place.
Brianna gradually becomes concerned for her partner through the movie, leaving him to his own devices at times but with Anthony missing, she sets out to track him down. She now bumps into Burke who kidnaps her and takes her to Cabrini-Green, where she wakes to find Anthony in a fugue state, not knowing who he is, no memories, nothing. Burke plans on having the police kill Anthony so that the Candyman legend can live on further. At the moment the community sees the legend as an instrument of suffering but Burke wants the symbol to be of vengeance. He cuts of Anthony's hand and replaces it with a make shift hook. He then turns his attention to Brianna, chasing her through the houses before she turns the tables and kills him with a pen. Anthony appears and collapses in her arms as the police walk in and don't listen to reason before shooting him dead.
Outside the movie draws to a close as the police force Brianna onto their reasoning, wanting her to admit that Anthony provoked them. She knows what she must do and summons the Candyman in the rear-view window whilst sat in the police car. The Candyman appears in Anthony's body, killing cops and once the final one is dropped, he walks over to Brianna with a hive of bees surrounding his torso and head. The movie ends with the Candyman turning into Daniel Robitaille, Tony Todd's character form the originals. He wants Brianne to tell everyone what she witnessed that night and the movie's credits begin to role with animations of the story and legends that have come from the Candyman as the montage ends with Anthony himself.
It was good to get another horror on the menu and it has been a long long time since I'd seen the original Candyman, possibly around 16 years ago personally to see a little revival was going to be a must see for me. Too many horrors at the moment follow the same principals. As with many sequels, the story is already there to help the movie on its way but because there is such a long time between this movie and the original, it was also important to set the scene. I think the storyling for this movie worked well in ticking the boxes. In order to fill the new viewers in, the movie started with some background and filled in the audience with past events so that they were quickly caught up. The storyline itself was a little bit of a slow burn and the transformation at the end thankfully saving the slower parts. It didn't come across as a slasher by any means and that in my opinion is once again down to how slow the movie became in the second act.
There is only one cast member that I recognised in the movie and that was Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and this watching this movie, he has impressed me with some other roles, but we'll get to those in time. He carried the movie well and it isn't going to be easy to replace Tony Todd as the franchise leader but if this does carry on, he more than made a statement in his quality of being able to carry this slightly iconic role into the next era. The rest of the cast were a first viewing for me, not really centered around but helped the story progress and were pretty ample.
It would be good to see this franchise finally get the recognition that it deserves just like Freddy and Jason, the Candyman can definitely being a character to strike fear into the viewer. I would have like this movie to possibly be a little more gruesome and hold a little more horror but it may just be setting the scene for what's to come. There were some underlying tones reagarding police brutality, white supremacey and political aspects which aren't really wanted within a horror and a since of 'being woke' spoilt the potential. I've said it already that there isn't enough horror aspect to the movie and standing in front of the mirror saying 'Candyman' five times without a worry will always be proof.
