A classic slasher movie gets a modern day reboot almost three decades after the original Candyman was released. Like the original this incarnation is also based on the short story by British playwright, Clive Barker.
Director Nia DaCosta, who co-wrote the flick with Jordan Peele (who also produced it) is trying to give it a sense of being rooted more in reality than the original movie, according to its creators.
In the centre we find a struggling artist who decides to explore a myth about the Chicago location where his studio is located and unknowingly to him unleashes a pandora’s box of violence, which puts him on a collision course with destiny.
The uniqueness of Candman is that it was written in a way not to fall into the usual pitfalls of horror flick formulas. It also attempts to make us believe that it is not setting up a new franchise, although this might be deceiving, as every Hollywood studio wants a movie to be lucky enough to create endless sequels to any movie they produce.
Candyman is DaCosta second feature as a director. From one side a follow up to her award winning, Little Woods, and from the other side just a minute before she is going to become a Hollywood mega director, following the release of her next movie, The Marvels, the much anticipated sequel to Captain Marvel. This movie still has the exciting feel of what you would expect of a sophomore director.
This is a definitely a movie that you can tell is masqueraded as a horror flick, when it actually is a social satire about society in America at large is a very elegant way. I liked it a lot and give it a THUMBS UP!