Candyman (1992) KILL COUNT

Welcome to the death

count

where we

count

the victims of all our favorite horror movies. I'm James, a Chinese guy, and today we're watching my favorite pre-scream 90s horror movie, Candyman, which came out in

1992

and is based on a story called The Forbidden by Clive Barker, the wonderfully horrible mind who brought us Hellraiser Candyman, is about an urban legend come to life, masterfully directed by Bernhard Rose and featuring one of my favorite horror scores ever composed by Philip Glass. Candyman is a thoughtful and sometimes dreamlike film that never beats you. head with the message despite the countless themes it explores, so in that sense it's kind of the opposite of a purge movie, although Candyman is about a guy with a hook for a hand that he uses to

kill

anyone who calls him in the mirror.

Candyman is not the cheesy slasher that this premise may suggest, but rather an ethereal slow burn that turns darkly romantic in the vein of The Phantom of the Opera when the man of myth pursues a graduate student played by Virginia Madsen with such intensity and passion that I will do anything for her to follow him to death Candyman is the best-known role of prolific actor Tony Todd, whose more than 200 credits include the mysterious William Bloodworth of the Final Destination series. He also sat down with me for my favorite interview to date. Be sure to check it out at the Crypt V Meetup.

We had a great time talking about Thai food and imagining what it would be like if I was on Rosemary's Baby Todd. He would reprise the iconic role in this film's two sequels, which eventually become cheesy. slasher that you may have been expecting and that we will see over the next few weeks after all, there is no better time for a lot of candy than October. The aftermath will give us more deaths and backstory, but before we can get to them, I have to start where it all began in the run-down Chicago Cabrini-Green public housing project.

How many deaths will we get from semen in Chai Town? Let's find out and get to them. The film begins with a title card, therefore, of fast music. Philip Glass Glasses' score, which used just a piano on the organ and some haunting choral voices, blends perfectly with the gothic elegance of the cell, to borrow a phrase from Tony. Shit, it sounds like the Phantom himself is hitting those keys, oh yeah, how's that? We continue with some bees and a message from Candyman about what he is going to do with that very useful hand. What is shedding blood.

Oh, what a great way to immediately set the tone of this movie. Although I'm not sure what's up with the biblical bee swarm over Chicago. Graduate student Helen Lyle listens as she is told a story about a babysitter in Indiana whose bad judgment didn't stop at getting naked with Grecia or Ted Raimi, but also extended to summoning the Candyman he delivered by saying her name five times. followed. mirror, that's right, Candyman is summoned by saying his name five times, not three common mistakes, but three is more of a Bloody Mary thing, although she has a chance to stop after four like Raimi.

That's where this babysitter does it. Clara goes to the end and says her name. a fifth time alone, Candyman then turned off the lights and died. Yes, I will count Clare on the list, although the veracity of this death is quite doubtful. What would this be if it were an urban legend? And yes, I know the student telling the story. He also mentions the death of a baby, but we never saw that fictional baby to begin with, so he doesn't go near the cow. Helen is collecting these urban legends with her friend Bernadette, played by Casey Lemons, who the year before had been in another esteemed horror film, Silence. of the Lambs are recording these stories as research for their thesis project on urban legends at the University of Illinois, where Helen's husband, Trevor, already teaches as a professor.

Trevor is played by Xander Berkeley, who you may know as a beleaguered foster father or a coward. leader of the surviving outpost and is very friendly to his students, especially the pretty ones like Stacy Change, don't shake hands with that homewrecker, Helen, you know what's going on here, you don't really think you know, of course Of course, yes, girl Helen transcribes. her interview about Candy Man, which is overheard by a custodian named Henrietta Henrietta and her friend Kitty, tells Helen about a woman named Ruthie Jean who was recently murdered apparently by Candyman, she was murdered with a hook, but unlike these working class women, Helen and Bernadette do not believe that Candyman is real and to prove it they both say his name in the mirror, although Helen ends up alone for the fifth recital.

The next day, the two take Helen's red car to Cabrini Green, which is where Rudy Jean was murdered, although Bernadette is appropriately anxious. Helen is determined to write an incredible thesis and find out why this community attributes some of their murders to a fictional mythical Cabrini-green man. A central part of this film was a public housing project in Chicago that in real life was in fact a site of violent gang activity for many decades, according to Tony Todd, there were five different gang factions operating there while filming the film. The production had to pay them to be able to film the exterior scenes and they even used some of them to portray the residents of Cabrini Green who were suspicious of Helen and Bernadette when they arrived, these guys here are real gang members who wear their own clothes to play these roles, although his dialogue was later dubbed by post-production voice actors known as loop groups, apparently those efforts were not enough to completely avoid any incidents, however, because Casey Lemmons recalls that a bullet was found in the production generator and producer Allen's survey says that on his last day of filming, his camera truck was shot in the nearly three decades since Handyman was filmed.

The area's crime rate has decreased and the last of the cabrini green skyscrapers was demolished in 2011. This brings me to the point where no discussion of Candyman could be made without the movie obviously being about race and coming out during a tumultuous time.

1992

was the same year that the Los Angeles riots occurred in the wake of the Rodney King trial, even though the n-double-a-cp gave Bernhard Rose his blessing to do so. After all, Candyman receives occasional criticism for his handling of the race, although he does present a kick. -Ass noir horror villain to join the esteemed Pantheon genre, he also sometimes resorts to tropes that can be seen as harmful.

There is a great special feature on the blu-ray called Unwrapping Candyman, where authors Tanana Redo and Stephen Barnes discussed Candy Man's complex relationship with Ray's and there are also countless articles and essays on the same topic available online. I don't have the knowledge or experience to talk about that kind of thing, especially in a death count, but I encourage you to do more research if you're interested. There is a lot to learn from this film in exterior shots filmed on location. Helen and Bernadette walk past some residents who they immediately assume are police officers. Helen thinks being mistaken for cops will give them some protection, so with that in mind, man, because the rest of the scene was filmed in a studio and she said she feels safe enough to take pictures of everything she finds. , like this Hamlet quote repeated on the walls, sweets for the sweet hand, this amazing metal door, oh yeah, I forgot to mention that this movie actually has quite a few jump scares.

I won't be too mean to him, although they go to the bathroom where Candyman reportedly

kill

ed Ruthie Jean by coming out of her mirror, but Helen discovers that behind Roofie Jeans Mir is another apartment and although Bernadette warns her against it, she goes up to see what there is on the other side of this abandoned unit. Helen finds an incredible mural of the Candy Man's open mouth that she just walked out of and even the sight of that thing leaves Helen feeling weak, maybe you did it. a little of those sweets to give you a little energy.

Oh, on second thought, maybe don't do that, since Helens is putting out a film for her camera, she and Bernadette go to lead only to meet a resident named Ann Marie on the way out, she's the one. with the scary dog, he also has a baby named Anthony, who he's just trying to raise here despite the reputation of the residents of this building being bad, we know as the massive hosts downstairs, you know, after bonding with Helen for her baby and Marie, played by Vanessa. Williams opens up and tells Helen that when Ruthie Jean was murdered, he heard it through the walls, now he is afraid for her and her son because they will never catch him.

Candice Helen and Bernadette have a smoky dinner with Trevor and another professor named Philip Purcell Purcell also studies urban legends and is excited when he hears that the ladies went to the Cabrini Green Candyman country. Turns out this guy already wrote an article about Candyman that qualifies him to deliver a long exposition monologue like Purcell/says Candyman was. the son of a slave who was able to raise the sweet young man in a difficult society thanks to the money he earned creating a device to mass-produce shoes. Can you imagine getting rich making shoes? Who had a crazy way of making money? says the guy who counts kills for a living Candyman dedicated himself to canvas and became a painter of portraits of rich people's families.

In one of his painting themes, a young white girl fell in love with her and when she became pregnant, her enraged father led a lynching that killed Candyman. At the place where Cabrini-Green stands today, they proceeded to cut off her right hand with a rusty blade, but wait, there's more, as Helen becomes a film noir character. Purcell goes on to say that Tandy Man's bloodied body was stained with broken honeycombs, prompting a million bees to directly stab him to death. Helen is bewildered and returns to Cabrini-Green to take more photographs of Candyman's artwork as she exits.

Helen goes to see Ann Marie again, but she doesn't look like anyone's house except the jump from her. Fright and dog, that's Helen, instead tries to talk to this little boy, Jake, played by an 11-year-old Dawan boy, although he's not eager to divulge the dialogue she's looking for. I can't say anything, a Candyman, bring me, she promises to keep her conversation secret, so Jake agrees to take her outside of her. He has two giant piles of wood that he claims are for an upcoming bonfire and goes up to a small bathroom building. Jake tells Helen that a boy was maimed inside when Candyman castrated him with his hook.

Helen, the always brave one. The skeptics head to the bathroom and find some stinky candy on the wall. Fun fact: The gross poop bear was made out of chocolate gingerbread cookies by makeup artist Bob Keane. Helen follows an arrow on a cubicle wall to discover a bee toilet. she's taking pictures of that urine a man in a trench coat walks in 10 don't look now but he has a hook in his hand whoa and a whole group that didn't know Candyman rolled so deep Helen tries to talk her way out of this situation, but in this case His luck finally ran out.

I heard you looking for Candyman's bitch, well you found him. Helen is mostly beaten off-screen and Jake discovers her in the bathroom before the scene cuts to who's great comedy editing we're on. Here, looking for Candyman's bitch, back up, big cut, probably the funniest moment in the movie. Helen, whose eye looks really nasty, successfully selects her attacker from the lineup and with her bruised eyewitness testimony, this detective Valenta was finally able to put the criminal down, the police are happy with that, since this guy is the one who Calls himself Candyman and who murdered Ruthie Jean after climbing into her medicine cabinet with the man behind the nickname arrested.

Helen tells Jake that she has nothing to worry about because Candyman is not actually real, he was just a myth used as a cover story. Not real mini Kenny, a few days later, after Helen retrieves his camera film from Bernadette, he has an unexpected visitor in the parking lot. Yeah, oh hello, he's finally made it half way there. in this fool they were invited to the arrival of the real damn Candyman. I came for you, ha ha, and with that cool trench coat courtesy of costume designer Leonard Pollack, there's no way Helen could turn down that offer.

Candyman walks up to her admonishing her for doubting his existence and making her cry with nothing but the power of his voice, well and his devilish good looks, it's not a problem man, you don't have to ask me twice, I know what's mine, buddy, You know, I totally agree with one guy, how could anyone? tell you no, I mean, maybe if they have a big phobia of B then things might get a little iffy. I guess Helen's reaction to Candyman was filmed in a rather unorthodox way. Bernhard Rose knew that he did not wantHelen Mild yelling at him. seeing the men as that was a cliché and also according to him a bit unpleasant and annoying just seeing people scream, it's also a fucking horrible noise.

Instead, he wanted her to be completely transfixed by Candyman and achieve such a rapt appearance that Rose took on Virginia Madsen. to a real hypnotist despite her initial skepticism, it ended up working on her and the next thing I know I'm having this conversation with the hypnotist and at some point I realized my arm was like this and I have no conscience. I remember raising my arm and thinking no, and that's a great destiny, let's do it again, so for any shot where Madsen looks completely out of place, it's likely that she was actually hypnotized since the hypnotist gave her gave Rose a word to use on set.

Whenever they needed Helen to fall under Candyman's spell, it was one of the many eccentric things Rose did during production, and sometimes Madsen felt very disoriented once he started hypnotizing me. He wasn't very aware of my surroundings. He couldn't really see the team. I could see the lights and all the lights became very, very blurry because my pupils were dilated and pretty much the only thing I could hear was Bernhard. Finally, after a day of filming that she couldn't remember in any way, he decided to leave the technique at the end. I was like, you know what I can?

Don't do it anymore, burner, don't come near me with that look on your face because I'm not going to go down. Helen apparently passes out from Candy Man's aura since she wakes up on the bathroom floor covered in a jacket and a lot of blood, but don't worry, Helen, it's not your blood, it's just Ann's dog's blood. Marie who is there. Helen stupidly picks up the bloody knife from the floor and follows Ann Marie's screams to a bedroom where she finds her rocking an empty, bloody crib. Ann Marie sees an attack. Helen assumes that she has kidnapped baby Anthony.

Helen is able to defend herself with that knife, but she seems quite aggressive when the police come in and break up the fight. Helen is arrested and taken to the police station to be processed by a cop played by Rusty Schwimmer was previously seen in Death Count as the angry restaurant owner and Jason goes to hell in John Gallagher Jr.'s sweet secretary. In the Belko experiment, the cartoon king tells Helen that she is under arrest for attacking Ann Marie, killing her dog, and kidnapping her baby. Trevor isn't home when she calls him around 3:00 a.m. m., but he picks her up the next morning and takes her back. house where they talked to her lawyer now they haven't charged you because they think they will find the body Oh, what a baby's body, I know where it is, it's hanging in building B.

Helen doesn't know it yet, no, so it is. Unable to provide any information that would make her seem less guilty and/or crazy, Trevor goes out to pick up some work—yeah, okay—and Helen spends the time drinking, smoking, and watching a slideshow of her camera pictures on one of them. she sees Candyman, no, no, no, the cool mural of him, the real motherfucker, you sure it's a good time to look at that Candyman portal. Helen, who knows what could happen. Oh shit, that could happen. That scare was actually legit since Bernhard Rose unleashed it. Virginia Madsen, surprisingly, was still a little angry about it.

Tony Todd, knowing he would scare her, didn't want to participate and after Rose convinced him to do it anyway, he ended up apologizing profusely to Madsen and then, of course, felt so bad that I was. really scared, but okay Tony Helen runs out of her apartment and finds the candy man waiting for her in the hallway. My victims, she runs back to her apartment only to find him there; standing right behind her, he scolds Helen to the ground for ruining the Candyman legend: you don't believe, destroy my congregation's faith without then I'm nothing and to make people believe in him again, he threatens to kill her, even though On the positive side it says it will make her immortal.

You could do worse on a deal. with her death during her negotiation Bernadette appears at Helen's apartment, she hears Helen crying and goes in to help her only to find Candyman waiting for her behind the door. The actual murder occurs off-screen, but after Trevor comes home and finds Helen with a knife. In his hand we see Bernadette's body being handled by police officers. Helen is arrested for the murder of her best friend and as she is taken to a psychiatric ward, Candyman speaks inside her head and tells her how wonderful it is to be a legendary ghost, she should try it.

At some point, Helen is tied to a bed and left alone, at which point Candyman pays her another visit, floating over her like a beautiful, elegant swan, a sweet swan, and now he has hidden under the bed like so many monsters before. for the hospital staff to inject Helen with some painkiller. Meanwhile, at Cabrini Green, baby Anthony receives much better treatment. She looks like she has all the honey she could want. Helen wakes up and is taken to see a psychologist named Dr. Burke, who has some pretty surprising news over and over the last month, yes, we've been stabilizing you with a heavy dose of Thorazine, wow, what have you agreed to do? a complete damn turn of the moon, she already plays a video of the night she was admitted, which shows her screaming at nothing even though we all saw Candyman planting himself on her in the air, neither me nor Helen, Candyman has been A product of your imagination all the time, I mean, if it was, I totally get it, girl, she asserts her sanity and says she can prove it.

Calling out to Candyman in the mirror, five statements later, she is able to say "I told you so" as Candy Man's hook emerges from Dr. Burks' torso, this death is the main difference between this R-rated film and the unrated versions, which you may have been able to notice due to the change in film quality. It's strange, no, I don't think there's anything too ridiculously egregious here with another death. This candy man with a bag of candy tells Helen that she is her nap, then he releases her from her restraints and straight up eats the disk from the window.

I love that crazy shot. I don't even care that you can see the rope while the hospital staff beats. at the closed door, Helen jumps onto the window sill and heads into the neighboring room where she knocks out a nurse and takes Rob's clothes off, hey buddy, that's really happening right now with her scruffy costume. Helen escapes from the hospital and runs pee. all the way home straight to a freshly painted apartment 10 guys that horrible color that would ever have chosen that piece of gum crap Oh Stacey that makes sense get out of my house no man that girl just wrinkled Trevor You see that shit, are you a dog?

Another little booboo, ha ha, no, but you probably just made a little contraption. Helen uses her anger to terrorize Trevor and Stacy and tells them that the color they chose is a tragedy. Fuck the walls. She's angry and threatening for only a minute, though before she realizes it. how screwed it is thanks to the candy man's gaslighting, hey, how pretty Helen, there's no one or anything left for you in town, all you have left is my desire for you, well, except at least you still have to she returns to Cabrini Green. and enters the abandoned murder apartment so he can go back up through the bathroom mirror and see what the candy man has waiting to woo some candles oh and a hook he could probably have guessed that he goes up to another floor and finds himself in the candy man's lair. platform with high ceilings and exposed I-beams that was created by production designer Jane and Stuart within this layer filled with church-like murals of our favorite b-boy made by graffiti artist Kelly Deco Helen strangely finds that Candyman is He's slept a little oh wait.

Isn't that guy a ghost? Do ghosts need to sleep? What do ghosts dream about haunted sheep? She's going to snag a big one, but he wakes up just as she hits him in the neck and that's not going to stop the Candyman. when he's so excited for Helen to come visit him, even if it's mostly because of baby Anthony, surrender to me now and they'll be an arm, they have a romantic twist that originally lasted much longer and included Helen declaring her love for Candyman, but apparently the studio forced them to cut it due to concerns about interracial romance.

It took two minutes of that scene and we found out that the studio was a little scared about the interracial context. They agreed with a tall black man covered in bees. but when it came to a kiss or something, it was a little too risky, I never heard of Loving v Virginia. Helen passes out and Candyman stands up in a tripod position and then walks her across the room as she recites something far away, a caressed dialogue, pain. I can assure you that the exquisite will be as exquisite as the pain. He says his deaths are about to get even sillier, since everyone in his congregation will talk about them like legends afterwards.

Sounds great, Candyman, but maybe tone down his annoyance with that. hook huh what kind of girls do you think Helen is maybe the type of girl that likes B's? In that case, here's a chest full of beans and a mouth full of bees. What is this infamous bee scene? It was filmed with live bees thanks to B Wrangler dr. Norman Gary Gary built an apiary on the roof of the studio so he could use those that were less than 24 hours old, as baby bees do not have fully developed stingers and are less likely to stick around, which was much needed for Virginia Madsen. , who it turns out was super allergic to bee venom, so paramedics were required to be on the lookout on set in case she got stuck.

Fortunately, she possibly didn't because dr. Gary developed a queen bee pheromone that was not only used to make the bees go where they wanted, but also helped appease them, as Tony Todd used a mouth bee dental plate built by effects artist Marc Coulier to prevent bees from crawling. with too much bum it didn't work a hundred percent of the time, he said he could feel one of the bees had gotten behind the latex sheet I put in his mouth and he could feel it crawling towards the back of his throat while he was delivering the shot and then that's when they caught him, we just blew it all out, ladies baking the bezel, it was pretty intense, they poked him once or twice with the mouthpiece because some of them didn't like the ping in Tony's mouth . but most of the 26 or 27 stings he suffered during the production of the three Candy Man films occurred on his chest when bees reacted negatively to Hellraiser effects artist Gary J.

Tuna Cliff's prosthetic design and in case he someone was concerned about well-being. of bees the ASPCA was on set while they were filming this crew and dr. Gary cleaned them all up afterwards with a harmless and fun gesture. Matthew Candyman takes baby Anthony and leaves Helen to wake up to a bunch of invisible bees and a message painted on the wall. I always feel like that statement is up to interpretation, but I've always thought of it as if Helen is some kind of spiritual reincarnation of the woman Candyman loved and died for the worse, or she's just gaslighting or more, who knows, hey cry to baby Anthony and follows his cries outside, where he hears them. coming from that pile of trash, another creation of production designer Jane Ann Stewart, who had the city of Chicago transport a pile of trash to build a giant pile with safe tunnels.

The tunnels were necessary since Helen is about to go inside. An effort to save baby Anthony by using that hook to help climb the hill inside Cabrini-Green Jakey pushes away the keys and looks out the window to see a hook descend into the pile of trash He is here so while Helen is inches away closer to the baby than she is trying to save Jake, thinking that the candy man is inside the pile of trash, she recruits other residents of Cabrini-Green to douse everything with gasoline while more amazing Philip Glass music plays just as She reaches the baby, they light the torches so they can burn. a burning pile and the candy man grabs Helen from behind her, intending to hold her captive long enough for them all to burn together and become a legendary ghost family and we will never be separated again.

Helen frees herself from the candy man's power by grabbing a flaming stake and stabbing him in the chest B with it as he thrashes about angrily, she crawls away with the baby and although a falling beam of light lights up on the path to Outside, she manages to escape against the candy man's wishes. I see, I would, but I have to do it. put out the fire in my hair, you understand right, Helen and her weird melting head prosthetic can bring the baby to Ann Marie while Candy Man succumbs to the flames and yes, I know he's a ghost who's already died before, but this seems like another kind of deathfor him, I mean, the guy turned into a bunch of fire bees right there and there's clearly a charred body left in this place, it has to count for something, but Candyman isn't the only victim of this fire.

Helen succumbs to her wounds when it is revealed in a scene at her funeral that she watches her bury Tam forever. You're really about to bring your new boo to your wife's funeral. That's in bad taste. It's good at first. It looks like Helen's funeral could use some padding in attendance, but her handful of mourners. They are joined by a procession of cabrini green residents led by Ann Marie carrying baby Anthony and Jake dressed as a sweet boy, I think because they are now Helens' congregation and as a way to thank her for all she did.

Jake drops the candy man's hook on his grave, adds a new ball, shows Trevor moping at home, apparently already bored with his new lover, yeah buddy, you should have appreciated Helen while you had her, now you're stuck with a college student who doesn't know. First thing about knife safety, come on, Stacy never cuts meat when you're angry. Trevor sobs Helen's name into the mirror a couple of times, and although the first one is very hard to hear, she says her name five times, after which we help her. You know, flashing warning lights, by the way, because Helen's scare is full of unnecessary strobe lights.

Helen, the sweet woman, the question mark kills Trevor with the murder weapon. She's inherited a bloody, twisted hook, and boy does she love it. The flashing lights are gone because all that's left to see here is Trevor's bloody corpse discovered by Stacey, who very conveniently has a knife in her hand. The film ends with credits playing over a new painting hanging in cabrini green, a portrait of Helen as a fiery-haired man. as Candyman promised that she will now live forever How many people did Candyman have as his victim? Let's find out and find out to the number What is it?

No, no, the bees, not the bees, uh, there were six victims in Candyman, made up of three women. and three men, although one of the women was just in a story that was being told and one of the men was like a ghost or something, no, the 99 minute runtime that left us with one death on average every 16 minutes and half. He gets the golden chainsaw to kill Dr. Burke, since his killing spree lasts the longest and involves the most visible hooking. It doesn't hurt that it was followed by that sweep back, window dive with all the machete to kill Bernadette because the act itself occurs off screen and the body afterwards has strange looking makeup and that's it.

Candyman came out in 1992 and in my opinion, it doesn't get the respect it deserves not only as a good horror movie but as a good movie in general. It's also good to know that apparently everyone involved remembers her fondly. Making Candyman was one of the best experiences I had. I'm so proud to have been in it because it's such a good movie that I loved it and I'm pretty sure at this point Candyman will be in my dog's first three lives and I have no problem with that. I'll be watching the first of its two sequels next week, but until then I'm James Agee.

Well, this has been the cocoa. Thank you very much for seeing this death count. I want to thank a bunch of sponsors like Cody Laws Alexandria Water Shadow Wesker aka David Morrison. Party by David Coons Steve Dorian Grayson I forgot to mention it during the downhill skill count, but I have a new camera. I'm filming in 4k, honey, the video is not uploaded in 4k, but I will do it one day, thank you all, be good people.