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Candyman is a 1992 American gothic supernatural horror film, written and directed by Bernard Rose and starring Virginia Madsen, Tony Todd, Xander Berkeley, Kasi Lemmons, and Vanessa E. Williams. Based on Clive Barker's short story "The Forbidden", the film follows a Chicago graduate student completing a thesis on urban legends and folklore, which leads her to the legend of the "Candyman", the ghost of an African-American artist and the son of a slave who was murdered in the late 19th century for his relationship with the daughter of a wealthy white man.

The film came to fruition after a chance meeting between Rose and Barker who recently completed his own film adaptation of Nightbreed (1990). Rose expressed interest in Barker's story "The Forbidden", and Barker agreed to license the rights. Where Barker's story revolved around the themes of the British class system in contemporary Liverpool, Rose chose to refit the story to Cabrini-Green's public housing development in Chicago and instead focus on the themes of race and social class in the inner-city United States.

Candyman was theatrically released on October 16, 1992 by TriStar Pictures and PolyGram Filmed Entertainment. The film received generally positive reviews and grossed over $25 million in the US, where it was also regarded in some critical circles as a contemporary classic of horror cinema. It was followed by two sequels, Candyman 2: Farewell to the Flesh (1995) and Candyman 3: Day of the Dead (1999). A direct sequel of the same name was released on August 27, 2021.

Plot[]

Helen Lyle is a semiotics graduate student at the University of Illinois Chicago. While researching urban legends, she learns of the Candyman, a spirit who kills anyone that speaks his name five times in front of a mirror. She learns of a recent murder at the Cabrini–Green Homes public housing project and two dozen others that have been attributed by locals to the Candyman. Skeptical, Helen and her friend Bernadette Walsh repeat the Candyman's name to Helen's bathroom mirror, to no avail.

Helen and Bernadette work together on a thesis on how Cabrini-Green residents use the Candyman legend to cope with hardship and inequality. She and Bernadette visit the scene of the most recent murder. There, Helen discovers a room where offerings have been left for the Candyman. Afterwards, they interview the victim's neighbor, Anne-Marie McCoy, a single mother raising her infant son Anthony. Helen and her husband Trevor later have dinner with an expert on the Candyman legend. He explains that the "Candyman" was Daniel Robitaille, an African-American man born in the late 1800s as the son of a slave who grew up to become a well-known painter. After he fell in love with and impregnated a white woman, her father sent a lynch mob after him. The mob cut off his right hand and smeared him with honeycomb stolen from an apiary, attracting bees that stung him to death. His corpse was burned in a pyre erected on the site where the Cabrini-Green Homes were eventually built.

When Helen returns to Cabrini-Green, a young boy named Jake tells her of an incident where a developmentally disabled boy was violently castrated by the Candyman in a public bathroom. She goes there to investigate, where a man calling himself the Candyman batters her with a hook. She identifies her attacker to the police, who recognize him as the head of a local gang, and is therefore charged for the murders attributed to Candyman. The real Candyman appears to Helen in a parking garage, hypnotizing her. He explains that due to her discredit of his legend, he must shed innocent blood to perpetuate it. Helen blacks out and awakens in Anne-Marie's apartment, covered in blood, finding Anne-Marie's pet Rottweiler, Annie, decapitated and her son Anthony missing. The police arrive and arrest Helen.

After Trevor bails her out of jail, Helen finds the Candyman in a photograph she took at Cabrini-Green. He breaks into Helen's apartment and cuts her neck, causing her to bleed and pass out. Bernadette arrives at Helen's apartment, and when Helen comes to, she sees that the Candyman has murdered Bernadette. Framed for the crime, Helen is committed to a psychiatric hospital. While being interviewed in preparation for her trial a month later, Helen attempts to prove her innocence by summoning the Candyman, who appears and murders her psychiatrist. Candyman then frees Helen from her restraints, allowing her to escape.

Helen returns to her apartment to find Trevor now living with one of his students, Stacey. Helen confronts him, then flees to Cabrini-Green to rescue Anthony. When she finds the Candyman in his lair, he tells Helen that her surrendering to him will ensure Anthony's safety. Offering Helen immortality, the Candyman opens his coat, revealing a ribcage wreathed in bees. The bees pour out of his mouth and stream down her throat as he kisses her. He vanishes with Anthony, and Helen awakes to discover a mural of the Candyman and his lover, who bears a striking resemblance to her.

The Candyman promises to release Anthony if Helen helps him strike fear into Cabrini-Green's residents. Attempting to feed his legend, the Candyman reneges and attempts to immolate both Helen and Anthony in a pyre. The flames destroy the Candyman, and Helen dies while saving Anthony. The residents, led by Anne-Marie and Jake, pay their respects at Helen's funeral. At home, the grief-stricken and guilt-ridden Trevor looks into the mirror and says Helen's name five times, whereupon Helen's vengeful spirit appears and kills him. A new mural of Helen dressed in white with her hair ablaze appears in the Candyman's lair.

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