Hooptober... And Then There Were Nine

35th Kill

Executive summary: Skip Nia DaCosta's Candyman remake and watch Kandisha instead.

Because this is basically a remake of Candyman as far as I can tell. The setting is the Parisian banlieues instead of the Chicago projects. Again, race is a key theme, but here it feels a little more interesting. Maybe it's just because this is a world we see represented less in pop culture, but this film really gives a sense of the melting pot of European, Arab, African and Caribbean cultures all co-existing cheek by jowl in these high density neighbourhoods. And similarly to His House, I felt a slight clunk as we move from social commentary into supernatural shenanigans.

In this case, it's more of a welcome shift because I gotta be honest, this movie takes a long time to get moving. The portrait of this culture is well rendered and interesting, but the narrative is slow. Also, when this vengeful spirit arrives on the scene (summoned like Candyman by having her name uttered five times in succession), the first couple of kills are a little underwhelming - the first victim dies because he gets scared and runs into traffic, for instance. Not really the brutality I was hoping for from Maury and Bustillo. But stay the course. It gets fucking gnarly in the final act.

The racial aspect feels elegant because it remains as subtext. By dropping these characters into a narrative, the social implications assert themselves naturally. The fact we have three leads who literally refer to themselves as White Girl, Black Girl and Arab Girl feels entirely natural - part of the banter that goes along with the gentle race-based ribbing we hear throughout - it reminded me a lot of the sort of shit that my Greek, Italian and Croatian mates used to sling at each other for a laugh back in my childhood in a multicultural neighbourhood.

But there's a nice gender riff here too, because Kandisha only kills males - as it happens, only males who her summoners are emotionally close to. It's so great to see a take on female power which uses our female characters' love for their male friends and family to raise the stakes and the jeopardy, instead of this bullshit, lazy Hollywood trope of painting all the male characters as either buffoons or predators. In this movie, the inextricable intertwining of genders within social groups sets up a premise requiring the female to protect the male from the monster - so much more authentic than just positing the male as the monster.

But all this stuff is worn pretty lightly. At the end of the day, this has its heart in the same place the original Candyman did - it's a supernatural slasher movie. The context is socially rich but the point of the film is bloody chaos and fear, and Kandisha does not skimp on the blood and chaos.

Best Kill (may contain traces of spoiler)

For starters, this movie does qualify for my Gotta Split list, with a very gruesome torso splitting scene. But I'm torn (sorry) because I think I'm actually going to give the gong to the guy in the steambath who gets trampled to death under Kandisha's horrible hooves. It sounds a bit silly, but the way hooves are used to slowly destroy this man's body is truly fucking horrific. Death by hoof must be one of the rarest methods of character death in a horror film, too, so it gets extra points for originality.