Candyman (1992)

Candyman is an awesome supernatural thriller. It is probably the best ghost movie I have seen since The Orphanage (Which is also highly recommended but also very sad! Be warned!).

Pros:
-Excellent acting by the lead actress and the lead actor.
-Original back-story.
-Brilliant use of myth-imagery.
-Excellent pacing.
-Eerie music, especially the creepy choir chanting in the background in many of the scenes.

Cons:
-I didn't see any...


UNBELIEVABLY MASSIVE SPOILERS BELOW!!!

 Candyman features a young woman, Helen, who, with her friend Bernadette, is writing her thesis on urban legends and their origin and transmission. She gradually discovers that the legend of the Candyman, a ghost who comes if you say his name five times and kills you with his hook hand, is based off of a real man who was brutally killed over a hundred years ago.

This movie could have very easily been a campy mess. Most ghost stories fall into this trap. This was partially because it did not attempt to add any silly special effects that would have looked ludicrous to a current viewer. The plot was also very excellent, very original, and had an unexpected twist towards the middle and, again towards the end. Most movies fail at pulling off one unexpected twist and this movie pulled off two!

The excellent acting also kept this movie from becoming too campy. Helen was very believable and sympathetic. She was also a much stronger character than many female protagonists are, which I found refreshing. Helen did not overact or behave in any way that was out of line with her character. Candyman was aslo excellent. The decision to cast an attractive man with a deep, velvety bass voice made him oddly sympathethic despite his murderous tendencies. A character that could have been one-dimensional and unimpressive thus became highly interesting and hair-raising.

As a woman who is very interested in myth and myth history, I was hugely impressed with Candyman. This movie was hugely evocative of many different myth traditions. It dealt with duality: man and woman, good and evil, real and unreal, etc. The power of belief was crucial; the Candyman sought to force Helen into believing in him through the perpetration of several grizzly murders. It was only when she finally admitted his existence through summoning him (calling his name five times) that he was able to actually kill her. This need to name him demonstrates a common myth theme of the power of names, and how that power can be turned against the one who wields it.

Another beautiful motify was the mirror as a conduit between worlds. Helen and Bernadette first jokingly call the Candyman in front of a mirror (calling to mind a similar urban legend: Bloody Mary). Helen also discovers that the apartment she lives in, and another building in the projects with a similar layout, do not have actual walls between each apartment. There is only a mirror. Helen passes through the mirror in the projects. Passing through mirrors is always an extremely bad idea in myth; they show us a world that is "other." The mirror world is similar and parallel to our own, just as the reflection seen in the mirror resembles, but is different from, our actual face. By passing through the mirror, Helen is essentially breaking the boundaries between her world and the world of the Candyman and inviting him back into the real world.

The power of belief is also mentioned. Basically, there is a concept that some things can only subsist through human belief. As soon as men begin ignoring or forsaking them, these things cease to exist. Barrie addressed this through Tinkerbell and the other fairies in Peter Pan who could drop dead if children said that thet did not exist. Candyman needed the belief and fear of a kind of cult in order to continue his supernatural existence. Accordingly, he was forced to kill innocents to perpetuate this fear and belief.

Candyman's relationship with Helen is also eerily similar to the relationship between Dracula and Mina Harker in Stoker's Dracula. Candyman does not merely wish to kill Helen; he wants her to want to be killed. He asks her to: "Be my victim," adding a disturbingly sensual aspect to the plot. Candyman also offers Helen immortality. He has framed her as a murderer, and tells her that she will live forever, and that they will never be parted, due to the horrified awe that people will have of her. Candyman lives and thrives in the rumors and legends of his cult of followers. His face and words are graffitied all over the projects, including the ominous Shakespeare line: "Sweets to the sweet." His is, therefore, a damned kind of half-life that is only possibly through a parasitic "feeding" on fearful mortals. What he offers Helen is the same.

Helen's refusal to accept this and be his victim could be read as a feminist answer to Dracula. What if Mina had not only destroyed Dracula all on her own but also taken his place? Helen refuses to be the victim. At the last minute, on fire and screaming in agony, she tears her way out of the bonfire to save the life of the child that Candyman had kidnapped. In this way, we see Helen's redemption. All of her beautiful blonde hair has been burned off and she dies, but her death is in defiance of the Candyman and becomes a sacrifice to save a child. This allows her to usurp the Candyman's place. He burns, screaming, in the bonfire even as the bald and burned Helen dies at the feet of the mother whose child she saved.

 Helen's husband discovers this eerie worship when the cult of followers who used to be fearful of Candyman come to Helen's funeral in a long winding chain to solemnly throw the Candyman's hook into her grave. The mother with the child that Helen saved and the little boy who told her the myth lead the progression. Through this, we see the dynamic and constantly shifting nature of these urban legends. Helen takes the Candyman's place, killing her former husband when he rashly calls her five times, and feeding on the fear and awe that once sustained Candyman. Yet, her reign is not as filled with terror. The last image of the film is a saint-like effigy of Helen, with a full head of blonde hair, apparently rising from the flames.

Well, that was a crazy analysis there!
I really couldn't find anything wrong with this movie. It was an excellent film and I recommend it to everyone who either doesn't get scared or likes being scared.
Rating: A

Troll Hunter

In keeping with the latest trend of giving movies titles that tell you EXACTLY what happens in the movie, I give you Troll Hunter. It's about a guy. Who hunts trolls. And the film students who stumble upon him and begin filming.

Pros:
-Reasonably accurate attempt to integrate myth while still making it unique
-Stunning, bleak imagery which I assume is from Norway
-I liked the guy playing the troll hunter.
-The movie is a nice length; it didn't drag on too long.
-Impressive Troll effects.

Cons:
-Sketchy science used to explain some things about the trolls
-Made in mockumentary style; if you are like my mother and find this incredibly annoying, this movie is not for you!
-The movie is in Norwegian. If you hate subtitles, either learn Norwegian or watch a different movie.
-Character Development? What character development?

Verdict: B. Worth Seeing.

SPOILERS BELOW!

I must confess a disproportionate fondness for movies with giant monsters that have been known to kill and/or eat people. This probably does not reflect well on my mental state. As a movie about giant monsters,

And if you like governemnt conspiracies this is the movie for you! There is an entire secret division of the government which is, apparently, responsible for hiding the existence of trolls. They do this mostly by planting bear corpses where livestock and/or humans have been killed by trolls straying out of their territory. I may be a terrible person for laughing at bear corpses*, but they really look funny with their tongues dangling out of their mouths and stuff.

Anyways, things clearly are not adding up, and there is some suspicion that this mysterious man named Hans is killing bears. Apparently, this is a grave poaching crime, and only an ordained and specially licensed few are allowed the honor. So, some students set out, determined to get Hans's confession on camera for a vague and never fully explained reason. I think the fact that they are journalism students is supposed to be enough of an explanation.

The quickly realize that Hans is, in fact A TROLL HUNTER. As the audience knows from the eponymous title.

Predictably, the shit then hits the fan.

I am now going to dwell on things that did not work in the movie because I really really like complaining. That is why I have a blog you see!

I did have several problems with this movie. First of all, the science was a bit shoddy. A lot of fantasy movies have this problem. Instead of just saying "it's magic! believe!" they try to use "science" to make the film more believable. Sure...

Apparently, trolls turn to stone (or explode...) when exposed to sunlight because their bodies have intense over-reactions to sunlight. This doesn't make any sense for vampires or for trolls in my opinion. Sure, you could get an intense burn that could prove fatal. But it is not scientifically sound to say that sunlight can make anything explode in under five seconds. Just call it magic. Don't try to make it scientific. The same goes to the fact that the trolls can smell Christian blood. As far as I am aware, there is no special Jesus blood-type possessed by Christians. This is a mythical element that, while very interesting, is out of place if you are honestly trying to introduce trolls as an actual, not-so-bright, non-magical, mammal that is bound by the same biological laws as everything else.

Hey, while we're on that, let's examine the fact that, according to the film:

1) Trolls can live 1000+ years.
2) Trolls can only have one child.

Okay... once again, not scientifically good! If you are going to try to make fantasy scientifically viable, don't be a dumbass about it. Mammals can not live this long; their metabolisms are too wacky. And no species can only have one child per female. That just wouldn't work.

Secondly, there was no character development. We had the troll hunter. He hunts trolls for a secret government division. He does not like it. Then, we have the intrepid film studies students. They are students who will get the story NO MATTER WHAT!. This, apparently, includes stubborningly going with the film maker in search of a 200 foot tall troll after one of their number, the camera man, sniffed out by his Christian blood, is gruesomely killed. So... is mourning for chumps now or something? And the new camera woman? They tell her NOTHING until they are already heading out to troll territory! There is such a thing as taking a story too far.

In other news, there will apparently be a 2014 American remake of the film. If you want the skimpy info on this upcoming project, go ahead and follow this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_Hunter_(2014_film)
So, there can be lots of fun in three years time with arguing about which is the better movie! Won't that be FUN you guys? Maybe we can troll the internet about it (did you see what I did there?!?!).

ModernHelen

*I am sure that no bears were harmed in the making of this film.

This Blog Under Construction

Hello everyone! I have decided to do a crazy crazy thing and start a blog where I review movies. I refuse to give any more specifications than that. Half the problems of life seem to stem from people's insistence on narrowing everything down as much as possible. Specilization is just another word for: Guess what? I gave up on learning anything else!

With that being said, expect a lot of the movies I review to be strange, strange things that you have never ever heard of before. And many of them will be horror... I am very cheap, so much of what I review will be from various libraries and internet sources.

But I will review newer movies too. I'm not entirely uncool! (my mommy said so!)

I will have two parts to each review:

1) Basic Pros and Cons and why you should/shouldn't see the movie
-I will not give away the movie here

2) A more detailed description
-there will be SO MANY spoilers here you will not even believe it. So don't read this part unless you have already seen the movie or you don't really care.

Enjoy!

ModernHelen

This Blog Under Construction

There will be movie reviews here soon!