RIGHT FEST REVIEW: CANDYMAN

In Candyman, young Grad student Helen (Virginia Madsen) is doing a thesis on urban legends and in her research comes across the legend of the Candyman (Tony Todd), a murderous man with a hook for a hand who can be summoned by saying his name 5 times into a mirror. Intrigued, Helen decides to dig deeper and in doing so unwittingly summons the Candyman who immediately sets about wrecking her and her friend's lives.

Virginia Madsen (Yes, she is Michael Madsen's sister) makes for a strong female lead as Helen Lyle(that we also get some boobage from, giggitty). As far as top 90's horror heroine's go,  I'd place her several notches above Scream's Sidney.  She is a willful, intelligent,  independent woman that also makes quite a few mistakes and spends a good portion of the film being tempted by evil. I really dug her character, and found it super easy to root for her.  Tony Todd is a frightening yet fascinating villain (Who has a rich backstory to boot) who seems to have a penchant for fur coats. He isn't in it a whole lot, not making his grand appearance until the second half or so of the film. Todd and Mansen share a pretty super chemistry, and when both are in a scene together fun times are sure to be had.

Before viewing this, I thought Candyman looked like a typical 90's slasher. Now that I have seen it, I realize I couldn't have been more wrong. This is a film that always found some new way to surprise me, and it's not at all what I had thought it would be. For a horror film, we don't get too many deaths (the ones we do get are freaking brutal though). In fact, most of the run time is spent with Helen as she investigates, it's not until the latter half that things really start to go BOOM!

Candyman has a Clive Barker-esque feel to it, which is  only appropriate considering it's based on one of his novels (and while he doesn't direct, I still think this is one of my favorite Clive Barker films). It's a film that asks a chilling question: What if each urban legend had some basis in fact? Candyman is pretty freaky, it has a dark tone and manages to be one of the more mature, adult horror films I've seen. I'd say imagine if Scream, Nightmare On Elm Street, and Hellraiser were to mix: The end product would be Candyman, one hell of a different horror-ific treat.

5 STARS