Candyman (1992) vs. Candyman (2021) -- A Specter Reborn, a Legend Reclaimed
Name: Candyman (1992) and Candyman (2021)
Directed By: Bernard Rose (1992) and Nia DaCosta (2021)
Subgenre: Supernatural Slasher
Series: Spooktober 2021 entry #14; Remake Rampage #3; review #107
Review: "I am the writing on the wall, the whisper in the classroom. Without these things, I am nothing."
A bit late to the game with this review, given that the hype surrounding the newest iteration of the Candyman franchise has mostly died off already, but I wanted to wait to the spookiest month of the year to see whether DaCosta's vision of the honeyed killer stacks up against Rose's version from 1992--and whether that original film still holds up today. It's going to be a bit of a long one (as these Remake Rampage entries tend to be), so get comfy--and thanks for sticking around. To fully appreciate Nia DaCosta's Candyman, it's imperative to have Rose's Candyman fresh on the mind; Candyman (2021) is a spiritual successor to the original (1992) much in the same way that Halloween (2018) is a spiritual successor to Halloween (1978): while they're both franchise reboots, they are technically sequels that have skipped forward in time by several decades. There are a lot of references to the original, and I'm avoiding touching on most of them since many spoil at least some aspect of the film. A bit of recap for the original storyline, and mild spoilers below should you still want to watch the original--scroll down to skip past them. Helen Lyle (played by Virginia Madsen) is a graduate student studying urban legends when she--and fellow colleague Bernadette (Kasi Lemmons)--hear about the legend of the Candyman, a vengeful specter of a black man who was unjustly murdered after getting an aristocratic white woman pregnant back in slave times. This Candyman fellow was actually Danielle Robitaille, the son of a black man who revolutionized the production of shoes in the 19th century; given his father's prodigious wealth, Robitaille enjoyed a life uncommon for black folk in that time, though his wealth still didn't grant him equality with his white peers. Robitaille used his place of privilege to develop a masterful command of the arts, primarily painting: he would use this talent to capture the likeness of others in the aristocracy at the time until he fell for the white daughter of a rich landowner. They fell in love, and she became with child; when the child's presence was found out, a mob amassed to hunt down and brutally murder Robitaille: his hand was hacked off and replaced by a rusty hook, and then he was covered in honey and beset by bees before being burned to death. His ashes spread across the land that would later become Cabrini Green, a government housing project. Robitaille's ghost lived on, kept alive by his legend, one that would grow and change with each retelling. Like Bloody Mary, should a person be so foolish as to call out his name five times while gazing into a mirror, the Candyman would come and cut them from "groin to gullet." Cabrini Green, already inundated with crime, became known for a growing streak of grizzly murders that locals attributed to the Candyman--it didn't help that a local gang leader also took on the mantle of Candyman for his crimes. Helen, while investigating the myth of Candyman, would come face to face with him--and the ghastly spirit who inspired the tales. Helen gets wrapped up in the lives of the locals in trying to find out more about Candyman and the crimes attributed to him and so decides to try out the incantation for herself. And wouldn't ya know it, that dadgum ghost showed up! Helen gets enthralled by the legends and their living counterpart, but soon learns that doubting the Candyman is enough to summon him forth. After a rapturous encounter with the spirit, played by Tony Todd, she denies the Candyman--which is fair considering he was trying to compel her to "be [his] victim." From there, she wakes in Cabrini Green after having apparently broken into a woman's apartment, decapitated her dog, stolen her baby, and then slashes the woman when she (understandably) attacks Helen for all of the above. In the story, Helen finds out that Cabrini Green's apartments are connected via their medicine cabinets; you can break into an adjacent apartment by simply giving the cabinet a bit of a push. It's assumed that's how she broke into Anne-Marie's apartment in her dissociative fugue. Well as a matter of fact, that's (and the previously mentioned death of Ruthie May are) based on a true story! Helen's life rapidly spirals out of control as Candyman sets up several encounters that end in the horribly violent deaths of those around her all to whittle away at her guard. With nothing left, she relents, and chooses to become Candyman's victim--the story, HIS story, needs a victim. But Helen ends up outsmarting him and saves Anne-Marie's lost child along the way, though she ultimately succumbs to her wounds in the process. Distraught by her death, her cheating husband calls out to her in their old bathroom mirror; he calls HER name five times, and she answers as Candyman had done before her. Helen is now a specter, and she came with her own hook and ready for vengeance. The Candyman myth changed. That's an important point to remember in going into DaCosta's reboot, as her entire story has deep roots in the original story.
SPOILERS END HERE. I won't go into nearly as much detail about DaCosta's Candyman since it's still very new, but it follows Anthony, a wealthy painter living in the now heavily-gentrified Chicago, as his life is overcome by the Candyman legend. Stylistically, the two films are fairly different, largely due to the limitations of the decades filmed in; Rose's Candyman has no frills, while DaCosta's is slick and modern--though the production doesn't quite capture the level of urban decay found in the original, and even though it talks quite a bit about the evils of gentrification, it doesn't show much beyond a few abandoned streets and boarded up churches. Candyman (1992) is a grimy movie with contrasting scenes of academia helping to highlight just how bad the folks in Cabrini Green have it; Candyman (2021) is very on-the-nose regarding the conversation, but mostly focuses on scenes of power and privilege--which is also fairly interesting given that it adds a bit of classist twist to the film, as the main characters are all black but come from different places of financial stability. Similarly, the kill scenes in the original have a more visceral feel: they feel weighty and far more graphic even with much of the gore being handled off-screen, and this is largely due to the amazing sound design in the film. Seriously, it sounds gross when it needs to, and the music-box melodies and chanting choirs make the film feel far creepier than it actually is. Candyman (2021), however, feels a bit removed, encapsulated perfectly by Candyman murdering an art critic in her apartment, and we watch on from the outside in relative silence--it's a neat effect, but it's also far less personal. Anthony's life as a painter (hint) gets upended when his new piece on the Candyman legend, entitled Say His Name, gets a huge injection of hype...following the brutal murders of two people at the gallery overnight who just happened to die in front of his installation. After being nearly lost to time, we then see how the Candyman legend begins to grow once again, each time taking its toll on Anthony. Like Helen before him, Anthony (aka Tony--hint) begins to lose himself in the legend until a freak interaction with the police seal his fate--just as they had with so many in his community before him.
The Candyman myth changed once again, just as planned. Candyman is a borderline vampiric spirit but, instead of blood, he feeds on belief; he needs to have his story perpetuated in order for him to continue existing, and each change in his tale will change his spiritual existence. The Candyman of 1992 was a tragic specter fueled by faith (and even doubt still occupies enough mental space to give him strength); Robitaille cut down any who called his name, regardless of race, until he found Helen, the missing piece of his original story. The story changed, and so did they. Except, she was forgotten about, her name and relationship changed until the two became one...until 2021 when, by design, Candyman's story grew once again, this time taking on the spirits of all of those in the black community who, like Robitaille before them, were killed innocently and without justice. This Candyman doesn't lay a finger on a black soul because he is now part of them, and they part of him. There are those who call this movie "woke." Those people did not pay attention. The Candyman feeds on faith. He lurks in the cycles of senseless violence, in those struck down without justice. For him to live on, so must that bloody cycle. If we heed the call to say his name, more will die. The Candyman will grow stronger still but, rather than seeing him as a borderline anti-hero for the disenfranchised black community, I find it hard not to see him as a parasite feeding on the systematic, generational trauma therein. But, maybe I wasn't paying attention either. Either way, I actually recommend watching both films back-to-back: they're each very good in their own right, and they each have their own set of flaws. Personally, the pacing of Rose's Candyman is a bit too quick once Tony Todd actually shows up, while DaCosta's Candyman lacks any real sense of urgency despite the fairly horrific circumstances. Candyman in 1992 is a visceral, personal film with incredible set design while Candyman's 2021 appearance is slick and includes a greatly atmospheric puppet-show to break up the monotony and entrench you into Robitaille's myth. Both are deep, insightful films with stories that are absolutely rooted in racial injustice, but both focus on different elements of that conversation and both are filtered through the lens the repeating cycles of trauma and myth. And hey, once you see them, you can have this high-brow, hoity-toity performative conversations just like me!
So, how about it: are you going to say their his name?
Overall Score: 4 out of 5 Chads holding tight to their groins and gullets. Both are worth seeing; they're equally impactful in different but related ways. Did Candyman (1992) and/or it's 2021 spiritual successor scare you? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
Comments
Post a Comment