“Candyman” chews on gentrification
91 minutes.
It’s easy to understand why 1992’s “Candyman” long has meant something to filmmaker Jordan Peele.
It was the first American horror film to cast a Black man as its antagonist and namesake character, with actor Tony Todd bringing to life what could be seen as the Black community’s answer to Freddy Krueger, a supernaturally summoned killer with a hook at the end of his right arm.
On the other hand, despite being set largely in Chicago’s Cabrini-green housing project, the film is told primarily from the perspective of a white graduate student, Virginia Madsen’s Helen Lyle.
And, arguably, it helped to perpetuate certain Black stereotypes.
Now, the writer-director of 2017’s “Get Out” and 2019’s “Us” — two films that, through horror-based storytelling, offer thoughtprovoking commentary on the black experience — has given us a new “Candyman.” And while Peele only co-wrote this identically named direct sequel to the 1992 movie — the directorial duties are handled by Nia Dacosta (“Little Woods”) — he certainly seems to have his bloody handprint all over it.
That’s not to say this “Candyman” reaches the heights of “Get Out” or even “Us,” but it is, as you’d expect, a worthwhile blend of scares and social commentary.
Set mostly in the present day, a decade after the Cabrini towers were torn down, visual artist Anthony (Yahya Abdul-mateen II) and his gallery-director life partner, Brianna (Teyona Parris), live in a luxury loft in the sincegentrified area.
With pressure from his art dealer and his creativity stalled, Anthony explores the ugly remnants of the old Cabrini-green in search of inspiration. After becoming spooked in an old, graffiti-filled dwelling, he learns of the Candyman legend — that this hookhanded neighborhood spirit would materialize and gut you from behind if you dared speak his name five times into a mirror — from a longtime neighborhood resident (Colman Domingo of “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” and “Fear the Walking Dead”).
Re-energized, Anthony returns home with a giddy desire to perform the verbal ritual with Brianna, who wisely rejects the notion. (Seriously, people, exactly WHAT is the upside?)
More importantly, Anthony has kindled his creative fire. He begins a feverish period of creation, which leads to his paintings-and-mirror-based
installation, “Say My Name,” being shown at an upcoming gallery show.
Without saying much more on the matter, deaths predictably follow a big exhibition opening, and Anthony begins a descent into, if not madness, mania.
You can’t help but appreciate the way this “Candyman” connects strongly with and pays homage to the original — yes, expect your fair share of swarming bees, as well as actors Todd and Vanessa Estelle Williams reprising their roles — while was also bringing a modern aesthetic to the sometimes-gruesome affair.
For instance, mirrors and other reflective surfaces are peppered throughout “Candyman” in very effective ways — perhaps never more potently than a scene in which Anthony has reason to become terrified while stuck inside a completely mirrored elevator. As shot by Dacosta and cinematographer John Guleserian (“Love, Simon”), the sequence feels impressively expansive and claustrophobic at the same time.
Abdul-mateen — memorable in projects including “Us,” “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and terrific HBO series “Watchmen” — is a strong lead. He has a commanding presence, which makes the moments in which Anthony struggles particularly effective. We feel his excitement; we feel his terror.
It would have been nice to see a bit more of Parris (“Wandavision,” “If Beale Street Could Talk”) because she’s quite good, but at least her Brianna figures prominently in the film’s fairly compelling climax.
Behind the camera, Dacosta has crafted a largely entertaining work, and it helps that, at roughly 90 minutes, “Candyman” doesn’t have a chance to overstay its welcome. Nothing here makes us less interested in seeing what Dacosta does with next year’s “The Marvels,” the sequel to Marvel Studios’ “Captain Marvel.” (That movie also will see Parris reprise the role of Monica Rambeau, which she also played in “Wandavision.”)
The screenplay is penned by Peele, Dacosta and producer Win Rosenfeld, and it presents plenty in the way of social commentary, much of it about gentrification.
A large serving of it doled by Anthony in a discussion with an art critic (Rebecca Spence) who finds his work interesting only after apparent murders at the gallery. At the show and after seeing “Say My Name,” she’d told him artists deserve a share of the blame for grabbing cheap studio space in poor neighborhoods, which helps turn them into trendy, more exclusive locations.
“Artists gentrify the hood?” he says to her later in an interview. “Who do you think makes the hood? The city cuts off a community and waits for it to die. Then they invite developers in and say, ‘Hey, you artists, you young people, you white (people) … please come to the hood. It’s cheap — and if you wait for a couple of years, we’ll bring you a Whole Foods.”
With dialogue like that, “Candyman” certainly gets its point across, but it also brings to mind a criticism Brianna has for Anthony earlier after he excitedly shows her a new piece — that it’s too literal and doesn’t leave enough room for interpretation for the viewer.