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Film: Candyman: Day of the Dead
Year: 1999
Director: Turi Meyer
Writers: Alfredo Spetién and Turi Meyer
Starring: Donna D’Errico, Tony Todd and Alexia Robinson
Review:
This is a movie that I feel like I caught part of on the movie channels as a teen. I’ll be honest, when sitting down to watch this for review, I didn’t remember anything. I’m a big fan of the original and I enjoy the remake. The sequel before this one wasn’t very good from what I remember. I’ll be honest, I didn’t have the highest hopes here.
Synopsis: The Candyman (Tony Todd) is back and trying to convince his descendant, an artist, to join him.
We start this movie off with a dream sequence. Caroline McKeever (Donna D’Errico) goes into a white bathroom where she finds a bathtub. There are flashes like the phrase ‘Sweet to the Sweet’ written in what looks like blood. She also sees her mother in the bathtub. We will learn that it was thought that she killed herself. Caroline also sees Candyman.
When she wakes up, we see that this is a recurring dream. There are many sketches she’s done of this haunting figure. Through Caroline’s roommate of Tamara (Alexia Robinson), we also learn that Daniel Robitaille was her great, great, grandfather. She has all his paintings and has a gallery showing coming up. She goes to the studio where she finds that her partner, Miguel Velasco (Mark Adair-Rios), is playing up that Daniel become Candyman. She didn’t want to exploit this fact. She also wants to humanize him.
This gallery is in Los Angeles. Dia de los Muertos is coming up and people in the area are preparing. Caroline meets a local gangster, Tino (Mike Moroff), who is quite nice to her. She also meets a David de la Paz (Jsu Garcia). It appears he goes a bit mad at the gallery showing, but that might have been an act.
This showing is where I’ll shift to finish out my recap of the story. It is there that as part of the event that Caroline must face her fears. In a mirror she recites Candyman five times. During this time, we also meet detectives Samuel Kraft (Wade Williams) and L.V. Sacco (Robert O’Reilly). They are both corrupt.
After what happens at the gallery, Miguel and a model he took home of Lina (Rena Riffel) are murdered. David is the prime suspect. Caroline keeps seeing Candyman though. This causes her to look to her past for answers and a way to defeat this entity once and for all.
That is where I’m going to leave my recap for this movie. Where I want to start is with things that I give credit to this movie for. The first is that I like that the writing did what it could to connect the first two movies. It is taking the back-story to Candyman and Daniel Robitaille that was started in the original. This movie is also saying that the events there happened in New Orleans. It doesn’t explain why the first takes place in Chicago. I am equally confused as to why this one decided to go to Los Angeles and incorporate elements of Mexican culture. It almost feels like they might have had a script that they decided to incorporate Candyman into. I don’t mind the idea that Candyman is following his family member in Caroline to LA. That’s not the issue there.
With that taken care of, something else I like is the idea that Candyman is powered by fear. This is something else that we got in the original one that is used here. Caroline’s fear of Candyman is what is fueling him. The show that Miguel did also is contributing there. A negative I need to interject is the people that Candyman is killing around Caroline. I thought at first that anyone at the gallery showing when she said his name makes them cursed. I can work with that. There are people that weren’t there though affected and they’re attacked due to being around our lead. I feel like this is nitpicking, but I have an issue when we are dealing with a curse or the supernatural like this. When it affects those that shouldn’t, it makes me question. What I will say though, I did like how they ended this movie. It made sense, even though it is taking from other movies.
A major negative to me is this movie was boring. It doesn’t do well in keeping my interest which is crazy since this comes in at 93-minutes. I don’t connect with our lead or any of the other characters around her. That is problematic when we need to care about her. I don’t want to slam her performance. I don’t think that D’Errico is a good actress, but she’s also not bad. I think she’s here for how she looks. She is wooden though. Not all the acting is bad though. Todd is great here. He is limited on what he can do. His voice and imposing size makes him Candyman. They try to make him a sympathetic character again, but I don’t know if it works. It doesn’t flesh out more than what we already knew. It feels like it is just assuming. It is funny to see Garcia in this movie, as I know him as Rod from A Nightmare on Elm Street. He was fine. I did like that Moroff and Williams were solid. It was also interesting to see Ernie Hudson Jr. here as another detective.
All that is left to go into would be the filmmaking aspects. I’ll give credit to here that I think that this well made. The cinematography is fine. It doesn’t do anything to stand out, but I don’t have issues. I do like how we will see something and then Candyman will appear. That is terrifying to think about. What didn’t work were the effects. The practical ones we get like the color and look of the blood are solid. The CGI wasn’t good. There are times it passes without having an issue, but in general. Other than that, I’d say the soundtrack was fine. It doesn’t stand out or hurt the movie.
In conclusion, this movie is a bit confusing. I like the elements from the earlier two films in the series. What doesn’t make sense is moving this to LA and incorporating so much of Hispanic culture into it. The only correlation that comes to me is that Caroline and David fall for each other, so they’re showing a parallel to what got Candyman killed, especially with Kraft around. He would signify the southerners who came for Robitaille. I like learning more about their lore and mythology, but it doesn’t mesh with Candyman. The acting is fine. Todd and few others are the standouts. I think the practical effects we get are solid. The CGI wasn’t great and this movie is just boring. I’d say avoid this unless you are a completionist.
Rating: 4 out of 10