Night 13: "But what's blood for if not for shedding?" Candyman
This movie begins with a cliché: a teenage girl telling an
urban legend that happened to a friend of friend. The friend of a friend said “Candyman”
five times in front of a mirror and then her boyfriend found her cut open. His hair went white and
he’s in an asylum now. This story is told Helen (Virginia Madsen), a graduate
student doing her thesis on urban legends. She finds out that Candyman has a
hook for a hand and haunts the Cabrini-Green housing project in Chicago. He was
the son of a freed slave in the late 1800’s and was a gifted painter who fell
in love with a white woman. When her father found out, a mob beat him, cut off
his hand, and covered him in honey so that bees stung him to death. His body
was burned and his ashes scattered.
Candyman, based on a story by Clive Barker called The
Forbidden, is a well-crafted, beautiful and haunting gothic romance. It was
adapted for the screen and directed by Bernard Rose who chose a structure and
visual style more in line with a mystery film that a fantastical horror film.
Helen’s research leads her to the housing project were a woman was allegedly
killed by Candyman. Her apartment is now a shrine to Candyman; people have left
pieces of candy in front of a graffiti portrait of him. For a long time you
feel like this movie may wrap up without any trace of the supernatural. Then,
far away and in shadow, he appears.
The score composed by Phillip Glass is evocative of
Beethoven’s haunting and romantic piano sonatas. Tony Todd is more than
memorable as Candyman, portraying him as a figure of fear and allure. His first
appearance is eerie, but his scariest is when he appears in a bored psychiatrist’s
office as Helen tries to explain that Candyman is real. However, other scenes give
you the feeling this is also a "beauty and the beast" story. The scene where he is
carrying Helen in his arms to his alter, set to Phillip Glass’s score, reminds
me of a vampire seducing his victim. He tells her, “The pain, I can assure you,
will be exquisite. As for our deaths, there is nothing to fear. Our names will
be written on a thousand walls… Come with me and be immortal.”
The tagline for Candyman is “From the chilling imagination
of Clive Barker” and it is indeed a chilling movie. There is blood and gore
but this not a special effects and makeup spectacular like Clive Barker’s Hellraiser or its sequel, Hellbound: Hellraiser II. There are genuine ideas at
play here (can something be real, if enough people believe it?) and skill in
the storytelling telling. Candyman is not concerned with making you jump out of
your seat (though that may very well happen). Instead it wants you lean forward
and wonder, even after the movie is over.
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