Candyman (1992)

Is Candyman the early 90s’ most iconic horror? Betteridge’s Law be damned, it’s definitely up there.

Famous for its outstanding Philip Glass score, Tony Todd’s booming voice and – of course – leaving a whole generation terrified by the idea of uttering the eponymous Candyman’s name five times into a mirror, this Hollywood popcorn movie plays it… a little less straightforwardly than you might expect.

Inspired by Clive Barker’s (yes, that Clive Barker) short story The Forbidden, director Bernard Rose transplants Barker’s take on the British class system from Liverpool into Chicago’s now-demolished Cabrini–Green housing development. Properly unsettling stuff and well-deserving of the many, many words that have been said about it. And, because we’re us – of course, it’s on a special archive 35mm film print from the collections of the National Science and Media Museum (thanks Bex!).

Fun fact: the UK 35mm prints of this film contain a few more gory shots that were cut from the US cinema release and from most digital copies released since. Enjoy!

Kieran Hall

One of the few genuinely frightening movies since Jack Nicholson cracked up in spectacular form in "The Shining", "Candyman" is an American adaptation of Clive Hellraiser Barkers' novel "The Forbidden", whisking it from the not-so-glamorous setting of inner-city Liverpool to the Chicago suburbs.

In the films lead role is Virginia Madsen, shrugging off her femme fatale image to give a credible and moving performance as an anthropology student preparing a thesis on urban legends, who keeps encountering the hook-handed mass-murderer Candyman in her research. A far cry from the loveable Hook of Peter Pan and Spielberg, ths guy is terrifyingly vicious, and can be summoned from beyond the grave by any woman foolish enough to look in a mirror and repeat his name five times.

Level-headed Helen (Madsen) treats all this as folklore, until Candyman's recent supernatural horrors (a baby is kidnapped, a dog beheaded and a bystander gutted) are attributed to her. As she attempts to unravel the mystery, so her mind appears to unravel itself, confusing events. Are they the work of a supernatural killer or a schizophrenic? Meanwhile the monster is attempting to seduce her into joining him in the afterlife...

From the stunning opening sequence that is both a perfect visualisation of the story's opening line and an early indication of director Rose's stylish take on the much-abused horror genre, Candyman both grips and terrifies. A superb tribute to the fact that you don't have to be stupid to scare and that horror can be intelligent and psychologically powerful without constant splatter on the screen, Candyman raises itself above the superficiality of most recent horror movies.