Chicago’s Cabrini Green area once again makes a great setting for contemporary American horror in Candyman, a direct sequel to the 1992 classic and not the reboot its name might suggest. This new feature also borrows some ideas from the original’s two sequels, Farewell to the Flesh and Day of the Dead, though there isn’t a direct story connection.
2021’s Candyman opens with a sequence set at Chicago’s former public housing project in 1970, and appears to rewrite some of the Candyman lore. Here, a young resident is ambushed by a real-world figure with a hook hand and fur-lined coat who doles out candy to the kids in the project, rather than Tony Todd’s supernatural entity.
In contemporary Chicago, the Cabrini Green high-rises no longer exist, having been demolished and rebuilt into gentrified luxury apartments. Artist Anthony (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) and his partner and curator Brianna (Teyonah Parris) have found a new home here, and learn the dark history from the first movie from Brianna’s brother Troy (Nathan Stewart-Jarrett).
Struggling to come up with a new concept for his latest piece, Anthony gets inspired by the Candyman story and goes hunting through areas of the neighborhood still waiting to be gentrified. There, he meets Burke (Colman Domingo), who fills him in on the familiar urban legend, and soon he has a new piece of art: a bathroom mirror that dares onlookers to “Say His Name.”
From there, Candyman’s narrative diverges into two paths: a more familiar slasher movie with a supernatural killer offing those who take the bait and say Candyman five times, and an inspired bit of body horror as Anthony delves further into the legend to discover what he has actually released.
Abdul-Mateen II (Bobby Seale in The Trial of the Chicago 7) is a clear standout here, and his body-horror storyline is more gruesomely effective than any of the bloody kills in the movie. The social commentary is also sharper here than in previous films in the franchise, and this Candyman does a nice job of staying true to Clive Barker’s original story, and Bernard Rose’s 1992 film, while delivering some updated and topical thematic material.
Elegant cinematography by John Guleserian capture nicely contrasts the gentrified Cabrini Green area with surrounding areas still waiting for repairs; a sequence bookended by a pair of slow zooms is a visual standout, though the CGI used in delivering a kill in wide-shot takes us out of the moment.
Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe’s original score is a perfect match for the material; the stark, detached theme instantly creates an atmosphere of apprehension and sets the tone for the film over its abstract depiction of Chicago skyscrapers in the opening credits. Lowe seems to be taking inspiration from composer Philip Glass, but not his score for the 1992 film; that melody is played out over some beautifully-animated paper cutout sequences that trace the history of the Candyman lore.
Direction by Nia DaCosta is largely first-rate, though the screenplay (co-written by the director with Win Rosenfeld and producer Jordan Peele) turns senseless as it attempts to weave the two narratives together during the final act. Still, even climactic story missteps can’t diminish the craft that has gone into this unexpectedly rich Candyman update to that point.