Candyman

Director - Bernard Rose (Snuff-Movie, Paperhouse)

Starring - Virginia Madsen (Dune, Swamp Thing), Tony Todd (Night of the Living Dead, The Crow), and Kasi Lemmons (The Silence of the Lambs, Vampire's Kiss)

Release Date - 1992

Genre - Horror

Tagline - "We dare you to say his name five times"

Format - Bluray (Personal Collection)

Rating (out of 5):

     When it comes to 90s horror there is several titans that battle to be the face for the decade that typically draws scorn from the dedicated genre fans.  Honestly, I'm guilty of dragging 90s films through the mud but I do enjoy a fair deal of films from this decade.   Franchises like Leprechaun, Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Tremors, and Candyman and iconic now and perfect examples that horror from the 90s should not be overlooked.  While Scream is probably the most popular franchise of them all I would admittedly say that it's one I don't care for with Leprechaun and Candyman being my favorite overall franchises.  Candyman and it's two sequels are films I remember renting often from my local video store.  I had a lot of fun with it and couldn't wait to revisit it.  When Vestron Video sent over Candyman: Day of the Dead to review I decided to this was the perfect time to revisit the trilogy.  

     The film follows Helen Lyle (Madsen) who is writing a thesis on local legends and finds herself going down the rabbit hole surrounding the Candyman.  Her investigation into Candyman lands her in the slums at Cabrini Green where she learns the backstory about Candyman and who he was.  After saying his name five times like legend suggests, she finds herself at the center of a nightmare that she can't seem to wake.

     The first Candyman film is a fucking horror masterpiece.  It blends urban horror, urban legends, and blaxploitation together to create something that I can argue was not done until this Clive Barker penned story was adapted into film.  Sure, blaxploitation dabbled in horror during it's infancy but nothing this dark and bleak was ever produced during blaxploitation's heyday.  Most of the blaxploitation's horror attempts were usually parodies of specific films and covered in the humor that made the films so much fun.  Candyman is no such film.  It's a movie that spawned in an entire sub-genre of urban based horror that filled video store shelves in the early to mid-90s.  The acting in this one is a lot of fun.  Tony Todd will always be Ben from the Night of the Living Dead remake to me but he will live in infamy as the iconic Candyman.  Hearing him deliver his dialogue while slowly stalking his victim still sends chills down my spine regardless of how many times I've seen it.  His performance is iconic for a reason and no one could have pulled off this character like he does.  The new installment does a decent enough job but it doesn't have the impact that Todd's performance does.  The supporting cast is great with a lot of stand out performances and colorful characters to make the film have more depth than it does.  Virginia Madsen always felt underwhelming in this one to me and still feels that way after revisiting it.  Her panic and distressed scenes always made me laugh and this go around it just felt forced and awkward.  The story for this one does more than explore an urban legend.  It shows the struggles that many struggling families, mostly minorities, go through in slums in the inner city projects.  It's social commentary on city live in the early 90s still resonates all these years later.  You then have the backstory centered around slavery and the mutilation and murder of a free black man by wealthy white people.  You center a supernatural slasher in the middle of all this and you have yourself a film that is unlike anything at the video store before it.  Finally, the film has plenty of bloody deaths with some great practical effects.  We get some awesome props, make-up effects, and the deaths fit in with the film fucking perfectly.  It's not that gory but the deaths work well for the film and add another layer of enjoyment to an already enjoyable film.  Overall, Candyman is a fucking iconic film and a testimony that not all 90s horror films suck.  I highly recommend this classic if you haven't seen it before.