IHR induction #30: "Candyman" (1992, Bernard Rose)

There are some movies that absolutely, positively must be watched by me in some form every October 31st. What's even weirder is that I actually prefer that the experience be on television; sure, I own Carpenter's "Halloween" and the first two "Hellraiser" movies (which are always automatic watches on the day), but you just can't beat the feeling of knowing that somebody else, somewhere, is actually watching the same movie at the same time that you are. Rather than being gore-focused or high-ranking on "scariest movies ever" lists, it's more the ambiance of some horror films that lend themselves well to Halloween viewing. And this is one of them.

"Candyman" is a film that I hold in a very high regard. It's one of my favorite movies ever, easily one of the five best horror films of the '90s, and is living proof to the contrary for all your moronic "all horror movies are dumb and/or misogynistic" friends. It's wonderfully written, shot with plenty of love and care by director Bernard Rose, and marvelously acted by an excellent ensemble cast. In short, the reasons to praise "Candyman" are the reasons that any high-fallutin' snooty film critic has for praising the current Oscar Bait out in the cineplexes. As such, this flick is actually a pretty good entry point for people looking to just get into the great, grand genre of horror; you can get your feet wet watching plenty of Bob Keen stage blood while also feeling like your film professor who says that all these things are the bane of cinema.

I wrote as much for my entry in my "Top 100 Movies of All Time" list, but this is a movie that brings back childhood memories. Because you know you all did it. At some point, in all of your childhoods, you were at a gathering at a friend's house when one of the little bastards suggested that someone in your party go into a bathroom alone and say the word "Candyman" into the mirror five times. There are variations of the story; in my particular hometown, the trick wouldn't work if there was light in the room. And by no light, it meant that there could not be one sliver of light shining into the bathroom of death; we're talking duct tape applied to the cracks around the door and s**t. And there was also some cryptic nonsense that the mystical name-chanting had to take place at exactly the stroke of midnight, or something. Long story short, nobody ever tried it; not because we were scared, but because it was just too freaking hard to summon the hook man.

Yes, folks, the Candyman fable is what is known as an urban legend; both the Clive Barker short story and this film take urban legends as their subject. The characters in the film are familiar with the concept of modern-day campfire scary stories; our main character is Helen Lyle (Virginia Madsen, in an excellent performance, although it's somewhat suspect that this is by FAR the ugliest she has ever looked on camera; I blame the hair, because she has only gotten HOTTER in the years since this film came out with straight locks), an uppity graduate student looking to write a thesis on the Candyman myth. The film even begins with a pretty damn scary scene showing one of these myth stories come to life, complete with "my cousin knows who he is" reference points from the teller of the story.

Helen, who is married to one of the professors at UI-Chicago (Xander Berkeley), has plenty of second-hand stories for her thesis, but wants more firsthand evidence. In a stroke of good and bad luck, she overhears one of the janitors at the University talking about a recent unsolved murder at the Cabrini Green housing project in the bad section of Chicago that has actually been blamed on the hooked mirror slayer. Along with her best friend and fellow graduate student Bernie (Kasi Lemmons), Helen heads out to the projects to enter a whole new world. And we're not talking the "Aladdin" variety here.

Roughly halfway through the film, we get a jarring stylistic shift. For much of Acts 1 and 2, "Candyman" is a sort of detective film, with Helen and Bernie attempting to put two and two together on the murders taking place at Cabrini and cull plenty of photos and accounts for their work. At a certain point, however, it seems like the mystery has been solved when Helen is attacked and left for dead by a hood who carries a hook and seems to be using the Candyman moniker to instill fear in rival gangs. All seems well when said hood is arrested, and that's when HE comes.

The film had led us to believe that the residents of the housing project had conjured up the Candyman myth as a means to deal with their own dreary existence, but it's a good thing that Clive Barker had other ideas when he wrote his story. It's never quite spelled out exactly why Candyman begins wandering around in the life of Helen Lyle and effectively sends her life on a tailspin of despair, if he truly is called by everyone who wishes to say his name into a mirror or if his very existence is dependent on belief in him. At any rate, the dialogue from the character is something to behold; Tony Todd, a classically trained actor who had been a veteran of horror films for many years before this, turns in a powerhouse performance as a somewhat sympathetic and tragic slasher villain. He's big, he's menacing, and he's got an unmistakable deep profundo voice. Every time I'm flicking channels and I hear that voice, I know to stop looking for more softcore porn.

The second half of the film is effective melodrama, with the Candyman slaying several associates and friends of Helen in what the film conveys is a means of bringing his legend back out into the world. The horror of the situation is increased when Helen herself gets blamed for all the murders. There's truly no more nightmarish scenario I can conjure up for myself than being wrongly accused of a crime, let alone blacking out every time a hook-handed, bee-spewing madman shows up and utters a bunch of Shakespearian gobbledygook about belief, the power of stories, and plenty of pleads to "be my victim." Put yourself in the heroine's shoes in this film, and you're in for one hell of an emotional experience.

Really, there's nothing more I can say about "Candyman." For fans of socially relevant motion pictures, there's plenty of subtext about racism to be had here in the story of the Candyman's origin, which I won't spoil here. But for fellow horror fans like myself, this remains one of the most effective psychological thrillers of all time, with truly awesome performances from Madsen and Todd as a Final Girl and Madman Villain who wind up being tragically intertwined in a far deeper way than we'd ever seen before in like-styled slasher flicks. I don't quite know what it is about Clive Barker stories that lends itself quite so well to September and October viewing, but whatever it is, I need some more of the dainty English water that this guy drinks.