Candyman 4 has some great ideas and its course shifting of the Candyman myth is interesting, but thin characters and on-the-nose politics hobble this one. It lacks tension and scares, and by putting Candyman off-centre robs this film of a delicious villain. Also, like the first film, this one dives off a cliff into a bay of nonsense two-thirds in only to return in the final scene with the best scene in the movie.
Nobody goes to see a horror film for subtlety so I'm not mad at the overt political messages of the film, its a way of getting important issues into the mainstream - but in Candyman (unlike other horrors) the social commentary isn't in the form of an allegory, it's part of the plot. This is also good. However, I was sad that all the messaging. and intriguing Candyman myth-making failed to bridge the gap between the slasher/gory elements. It felt like two different films were vying for attention - a potentially interesting film about gentrification and black trauma meets a gory kill-repeat film; it's an unhappy marriage. It also missed the pursuit element of the first film, where Tony Todd's Candyman loomed large despite few appearances; in this new Candyman, the bogeyman, (a few briefs moments aside) doesn't chill, scare, or thrill...
A missed opportunity, but still a very interesting one. 5 out of 10.
Within five minutes you realise you're in the Kingdom of the Hyper-Woke - didn't get any further - disc went back in the envelope and returned to CP the following day
This was an OK horror film but sadly the characters aren't as interesting and doesn't contain as much of the candyman as it should. The set pieces aren't scary or creepy as it thinks it is. The ending was all rather silly too.
That being said its hard to not compare the much better original film. So on its own merits is OK for one time watch.
The horror icon of Candyman seems to resonate much grander over time. He was a monster born from hatred as a wronged slave seeking vengeance. He was murdered by bees and uses those insects to enact his long-game revenge as the modern world turns its back on the racist past. He exists as a legend and a reminder that old wounds won’t heal if concealed. So it’s no surprise the bee-themed and hook-wielding horror character is reborn once more.
Of course, things have changed quite a bit since the 1990s. This sequel attempts to address the rising gentrification that has made ghettos a dying breed and transforms the land of past atrocities into a much different society. The focus turns toward Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), an artist living in the city. As a black man trying to make his voice heard, he’s torn about his ascension into the upper tiers of the modern millennials. While he loves doing art, the gallery he’s working for mostly wants the black power-themed pieces to seem more socially conscious. The bitterness of treating African-Americans as a commodity weighs a bit on his mind. It also complicates his relationship with Brianna Cartwright (Teyonah Parris), an art gallery director.
Seeking some new inspiration, Anthony takes a bigger interest in the urban legend of Candyman. Intrigued by the premise of summoning him by saying his name three times in a mirror, he presents a challenge to his audience. He develops a mirror with the title “Say My Name,” daring the viewer to speak the name of Candyman three times to see if he appears. Of course, since this is a Candyman film and the audience will feel cheated if they don’t see some supernatural bloodshed, we know he’s coming and not some imaginary terror. No ambiguity in this social horror, but that’s okay. The real horror lies in confronting the past, either through Anthony’s investigation or through summoning the hook-handed killer to see what he’s all about.
Director Nia DaCosta brings a style all her own into this revisit of Candyman. The best visuals are by far the shadow puppetry of telling Candyman’s story. This sequence is so great that you’ll be able to see it in its entirety for the end credits. There’s also some cleverness with portraying Candyman appearing in the mirror and trying to use Anthony as a vessel. While this aspect does lean into Nightmare on Elm Street 2 territory that often mixes the messaging from personal identity to greater social ills, parts of it work surprisingly well.
As the fourth film in the Candyman saga, the script feels as though it has a lot to say but struggles to find a way to make it all connect. It’s perhaps a problem of complexity in that there is so many angles on how to explore Candyman’s update for a new era of societal change and systemic racism. Yet the film seems as though it wants to cover all of them and often times with more of a broad brush. Police brutality is touched on here and there but presented in a way that doesn’t feel so much preachy as it does par for the course. As satisfying as it is to watch Candyman gore a slew of corrupt police officers, there’s a bitterness to the climax of this scene in which the new Candyman urges the witnesses to tell their stories and keep legends alive. Legends can only do so much when trying to tackle issues of the here and now when the past rarely gets a voice.
Candyman certainly fits neatly into the new social horror landscape but only about as snug as one would expect. Maybe I expected too much of a Candyman movie such as this and over time I’ll probably hold more fondness for it. It is rather poetic, however, how online reactionaries are proving the point of Candyman being an important ghost of the past to remember. For being about racism and gentrification, some claimed Candyman had gone woke. Candyman has always been about racism and gentrification, including the original short story by Clive Barker. How soon we forget the past.