Movie Review: 'Candyman' 2021

Candyman 2021 stars Yahya Abdul Mateen II as Anthony, a rising star in the Chicago art world. Anthony has been struggling of late since he and his girlfriend, Brianna (Teyonna Parris) moved to their new apartment. In need of inspiration, Anthony becomes enamored with a story Brianna’s brother Troy (Nathan Stewart Jarrett) tells one night over drinks. Troy tells the story of Helen and The Candyman, an entity that can be summoned by saying his name 5 times.

The legend of Candyman lingers over a nearby Chicago neighborhood now almost completely leveled by gentrification. Breanna dismisses the story as an urban legend but Anthony can’t shake his interest in it and the following day he goes to what is left of Cabrini Green, the housing project that saw the end of Candyman and Helen in a fiery conflagration. There, Troy meets Burke (Colman Domingo), a friendly shopkeeper and handyman who is willing to share some of the details behind the legend of the Candyman.

His version of the story is different from the Candyman and Helen story. Rather, he tells the story of Sherman, an unfortunate man with a hook for a hand. Sherman gave out candy to kids and while it’s certainly creepy, it didn’t make him a killer. Coincidentally, in the same neighborhood as poor Sherman the candyman, a piece of candy was found to have a razor blade in it, nearly killing a child. Connecting Sherman to the candy, Chicago Police descended on the Candyman and beat him to death. Sherman’s death was so tragic and violent that he transcended into Candyman, the latest in a series of tragic figures who’ve carried the name first made famous by Daniel Robitaille, the name of the original man who became Candyman.

Inspired, Anthony creates an installation that first recreates the Candyman and Helen story. The installation includes a mirror and instructions on how to enact the legend of Candyman. This leads to the death of a pair of art dealers and sets off a chain of events that revive the legend of Candyman which had fallen into obscurity before Anthony became obsessed with it. With Burke’s background, Anthony becomes consumed by the legend while all Breanna can do is watch in horror as he slips further into his single minded obsession.

Candyman was co-written and directed by Nia DaCosta, a very smart director who makes great choices in presenting the story of Candyman. Throughout the retelling of the story of Candyman, the story appears as stick figure shadow plays. The style is gorgeous and inventive and it sets Candyman apart from the horror pack with its inventiveness. Sadly, it doesn’t prevent the movie from the pitfalls of exposition.

The biggest flaw of the modern Candyman is the use of Colman Domingo’s Burke as Captain Exposition. Domingo is a wonderful actor who never fails to make an impression but he can’t escape how the character of Burke functions as a gear in a plot machine. He’s on hand to layer in the backstory for the audience and provide critical plot momentum. So much of the rest of Candyman is a corrective to the original but this functionary character, Burke, undercuts some of what is very good about Candyman 2021.

Candyman 2021 corrects the original narrative by focusing on characters of color to tell the story of a tragedy that befell a series of black men. Candyman 2021 goes all in on the idea that the heinous, unjustified murders of a series of black men created a supernatural force built from anger, despair, grief and a desire for vengeance that manifested in Candyman. It’s the same idea that drives several legendary myths and it’s a good idea for the creation of a horror movie legend.

Candyman 2021 pulls no punches in portraying the tragedies of Police violence or white on black violence. The scene where Sherman the Candyman is killed is punctuated not by his beaten and bloodied corpse but by the sight of far more Police Officers than are certainly necessary to arrest one man. The synced, jogging movement of these stormtroopers and the cracks of their batons punctuated by Sherman’s anguished wales tells the story as well or better than seeing his broken body ever could.

There remains in Candyman lore the issue of the hook. I mentioned this in my review of Candyman 1992, find the link in my profile here, I don’t get the hook for a hand. It’s not symbolic of anything and it is inexplicable in the story of Daniel Robitaille. It makes more sense in the story of Sherman as he was a man with a prosthetic hook for a hand but otherwise, it’s still more of a marketing inclusion than anything else. The hook has always been Candyman’s version of Freddy Krueger’s glove, a calling card for movie posters and Halloween costume tie-ins.

And I guess there is nothing wrong with having a gimmick for Candyman, it’s just that this particular gimmick is far too obviously a gimmick. It makes no sense for people lynching a man to attach a weapon to his body. It would make sense symbolically if they attached a sharecropper tool to his hand as a symbolic gesture to say that despite his escape from slavery, Daniel Robitaille was still a slave in the eyes of his assailants, but this hook is just a hook. Why was it even present at Robitaille’s lynching? Why attach it to his hand? What does that say about Robitaille? Why include it if it has no meaning beyond an outside the universe function as a marketing gimmick? It’s inorganic, it breaks the fourth wall by being so blatantly not part of a rational narrative.

Regardless of the stupid, nonsense, unneeded hook weapon, Candyman 2021 is a far better movie than the 1992 Candyman. I would like to have a fleshing out of Colman Domingo’s Burke, a stronger motivation for his character would shore up the construction of Candyman 2021, but it’s not bad enough issue to ruin the movie. Director Nia DaCosta’s ideas and presentation are strong enough that even a rather mechanical plot can’t keep the movie from being memorable and resonant.

Candyman 2021 is in theaters nationwide as of August 27th, 2021.