The slasher genre of films is one that is massively popular and home to a huge variety of horror films under its belt, with some of its most famous including Halloween, Friday the 13th, Scream and Nightmare on Elm Street. But of the more underground slasher films that seems to have slipped people’s memory is the 1992 film, Candyman. Based on one of the short stories created by short story writer Clive Barker titled ‘’The Forgotten’’, Candyman is regarded in some critical circles as a contemporary classic of horror cinema, featuring many definable traits of said genre as well as having two sequels and a ‘’spiritual successor’’ coming out in 2020 being made by Jordan Peele, and this was the one that started it all. Graduate student Helen Lyle (played by Virginia Madsen) is working on a research paper about urban legends and decide to focus her attention on the Candyman, a spirit that kills his victims if his name is repeated five times in the mirror. When she finds out too much and tempts the hook-handed ghost too much by saying his name, The Candyman (played by Tony Todd) plans to make her his replacement by framing her for his murders, with everyone around her seeing her as insane. With time running out and with no one else left to help her, Helen has to confront and stop Candyman before she is put away for good or even becomes his next victim. As a generic slasher film goes, the film does a much better job at elements that are usually handled pretty poorly in this kind film which results in a flawed but overall haunting and memorable experience.

For most slasher films, the story is often not one that is given that much focus; with more of the attention going towards concepts for the villains and creative ways to kill the simple characters they build up in the film. Here though the direction is made a lot more interesting with a heavier drive into a mystery element, showing very little of the killer and allow the world and characters to be appropriately built up before the film finishes. Because of this, the opening act of the film is quite engaging; doing a good job setting up the killer with a really good backstory, allowing the motivations for the main character to be set up effectively as well as the supporting cast role, and even adding in a nice touch of commentary surrounding the influence and power of urban legends and the all-too familiar racism issues. It keeps the audience guessing waiting for Candyman to show up and the intrigue of why and how he works is left hanging just enough that wants people wanting more. The problem comes when Candyman ironically shows up, which proceeds to ignore the film’s admirable effort of going against type for a slasher film and falls back into a pretty predictable formula of the main character being blamed for the murders and no one believing her. The pace slows down, the mystery completely disappears, characters star to drop off one by one, most of the commentary is gone, and the final act gets a bit too confusion as it stopped trying to explain the finer details leaving many holes unanswered. With that said, nothing about it is technically done wrong and the ending result is a great twist on the typical slasher villain trope and calls back to the urban legend issues.

The characters in the film do slightly suffer from the usual slasher film trope issues in that they aren’t quite as fleshed out as they should be and even some (particularly the main character’s husband) is solely there just to be a one-note slimeball to get comeuppance by the end, but to this film’s credit it does do things a bit better than those as the film does try to flesh out the two most important people in the film; the main character and the villain. The main character, Helen is well played by Virginia Madsen and is likeable enough that the audience doesn’t want to see her get killed by the film’s conclusion although the connection made between her and Candyman is not only strange but also completely goes unexplained and comes off as really uncomfortable without context. Candyman himself has become a famous figure in the horror films line-up with his memorable design, amazingly iconic voice and his severe brutality. Tony Todd is a great choice as the character; with his sinister bone-chilling voice that works on a coolness and threatening level. Also, all of his characteristics and details down to his designs, methods of killing and even physical appearance perfectly match up with his backstory, giving It more purpose and fleshing him out more. While most of the other people are not that interesting, they are acted pretty well and do a good job building gup the presence of Candyman without feeling completely pointless and out of nowhere.

The themes of the film are slightly confused with what they want to focus on and that can be chalked back to the development discussions that were going on behind the scenes, with the director Bernard Rose, choosing to refit the short story into theme of race and social class in the inner city United States as opposed to Clive Barker’s heavier focus on the British Class System in contemporary Liverpool. While overall the message was a little bit muddled with how the story decided to progress itself, the change in scenery into Cabrini-Green’s public housing development in Chicago may seem like a strange choice, but actually added to the film’s overall tone. The location’s damp, dirty, unclean incredibly hostile atmosphere not only added to the overall uncomfortable mood that builds throughout the whole film, but the design of the building features so many narrow hallways, tight shots and crevice-shaped holes that it literally feels like being in a beehive (a strong element within this film). The cinematography for the film also shows this motif; either having tight close behind the shoulder shots that increase the claustrophobic feel or otherworldly overview or distant shots that feels like they are constantly being watched. The muted colors, the dull lighting, and the excessive amount of gore displayed results in a movie that feels unpleasant to sit through in the best way possible. Though barely any on-screen blood or death is shown, the way the blood is smeared in scenes and how well the moment is built up and delivered results in an instant squeamish feeling. The musical score composed by Phillip Glass is also pretty good; mixing a operatic choir with haunting pianos leading to a tone that sound both memorable and off-putting at the same time.

Its very hard to make a good slasher film that stands out from any other horror film; even some of the more famous examples would later become dated and predictable with its overuse of sequels, and even Candyman appears to have suffered a similar fate. But as a stand-alone film, this is one of the better slasher films of its type. With some good attempts to manoeuvre around most of the tropes and try to build its mythos and characters to a point beyond simple and wasteful, the film has some great atmosphere, am interesting set-up, good actors, gruesome environment, and a memorable killer to make worth a viewing. With bees within him and a hook for a hand, Candyman has made his way into the horror killer line up. Now only time will tell how Jordan Peele handles the remake.