| The SF, Horror and Fantasy Film Review |
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| Science-Fiction |
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CANDYMAN: DAY OF THE DEAD
Rating: 
USA. 1999.
Director – Turi Meyer, Screenplay – Turi Meyer & Al Septien, Producers – Al Septien & William Stuart, Photography – Michael G. Wojciechowski, Music – Adam Gorgoni, Visual Effects – Grac Belli, Mechanical Effects – Ultimate Effects (Supervisors – John Hartigan & David Waine), Makeup Effects – Image Animation (Supervisors – Bill Deacon, Claire Jane Deacon & Gary J. Tunnicliffe), Production Design – Marc Graveille-Masson. Production Company – Artisan Entertainment/Aurora Productions.
Cast:
Donna D’Errico (Caroline McKeever), Tony Todd (Candyman/Daniel Robitaille), Wade Andrew Williams (Detective Samuel Kraft), Nick Corri ‘Jesu Garcia’ (David De La Paz), Alexia Robinson (Tamara), Mike Moroff (Tino), Robert O’Reilly (Detective Sacco), Ernie Hudson Jr (Detective Jamal Matthews), Mark Adair-Rios (Miguel Velasco), Lupe Ontiveros (Abdula), Elizabeth Hayes (Annie Tarrant), Nicole Contreras (Christina De La Paz), Rena Riffel (Lina)
Plot: Caroline McKeever, the great-great-granddaughter of Daniel Robitaille, allows a gallery owner in East L.A. to present an exhibition of Robitaille’s artworks, exploiting the Candyman connection. At the opening, the owner challenges Caroline to say “Candyman” five times in a mirror. Immediately after Robitaille appears to her, killing the people around her and demanding she cross over and join him.
Candyman: Day of the Dead was the third (and so far last) of the films begun with Bernard Rose’s interesting Clive Barker adaptation Candyman (1992). Candyman had been a modest international and big video hit. It was followed by a sequel, Bill Condon’s dull Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh (1995), and this third entry, which was released direct to video.
Day of the Dead is at least better than Farewell to the Flesh, although it’s ultimately only a formulaic sequel. The plot is a rehash of the first film – woman summons Candyman who then becomes fixated on her, tormenting her, killing all those around her and letting people believe she is responsible. Director Turi Meyer achieves some well-photographed atmosphere. Meyer does a particularly good job of winding in elements of Latino culture. Here the film is at its best, achieving a nicely subdued quiet. But Meyer is less effective at generating scares. He tends to rely on irritating false jumps – someone leaping out pretending to be a psycho as soon as Donna D’Errico says Candyman five times in the mirror; D’Errico’s roommate screaming but it turning out to only be for a role she is rehearsing; bodies swinging into the camera. There is one original scene with Donna D’Errico arrested in a cop car as Candyman appears in the front seat, gutting the cop with a hook that tears right through the seat – only for her to then find she is trapped in the backseat with no doorhandles and having to climb over the body to get out (although the scene is subsequently ruined by the old hat cliche of the body returning to life just as she climbs across it). Day of the Dead stars former Playboy model and Baywatch (1989-2001) bimbo Donna D’Errico who, not unexpectedly, spends a lot of time running around in her underwear. There’s a silly ending with the means to kill Candyman coming out of nowhere – it being introduced as a bogus solution only a moment before it is used. Although the final epilogue about killing Candyman by killing the myth is a thoughtful and original end (?) to the series.
Turi Meyer had previously directed Sleepstalker (1995) and went onto direct the dire Alien Express/Dead Rail (2005). Meyer has also written other genre films Leprechaun 2 (1994), Galgameth (1996) and Wrong Turn 2: Dead End (2007).
Copyright Richard Scheib 2001
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