APT, HORROR PRESENTS
From rumor to flesh:
How candyman treats tragedy in VILLAINY
Ava M. Fields
CANDYMAN (1992): TO LIVE IN RUINS
“If you had learned just a little from me, you would not beg to live. I am rumor. It is a blessed condition, believe me. To be whispered about at street corners. To live in other people’s dreams, but not to have to be.”
APT, HORROR: Candyman (1992)
Apt, Horror is an innovative approach to community data gathering (+ analysis). The project sees theories transformed into meaningful conclusions, using the horror genre as a reputable source and grounding it as an applied practice for strategic community development.
APT, HORROR PROJECT Documents
Candyman (1992) + Apt, Horror: How i see things
PROJECT PRINCIPLES
+Perspective: A particular attitude toward or regarding something; a point of view.
+Equity: Addressing needs in reflection of circumstances, demographics, and identities.
+Compassion or 'A Responsibility to Bear Witness.'
+Repurposing or 'Other people's Trash, My Treasure.'
+Subversion or ‘Established Does Not = Best.'
+Catharsis or 'Horror is Cheaper Than Retail Therapy.'
+Perspective or 'We Don't Get to Choose Our Victims.'
TERMS TO KNOW
+Catharsis: Releasing untapped emotions and thereby finding relief.
+Compassion: Empathy and concern for the suffering and misfortune of others.
+Repurposing: Using something for a purpose other than what was initially intended.
+Subversion: Undermining the power and authority of an established system or institution.
20% OF PARTICIPANTS: MA, CT, RI, CO, CA, TX, MD, ME, FL, and NH
33% OF PARTICIPANTS IDENTIFIED AS AFRICAN AMERICAN AND OR BLACK AMERICAN.
66.7% OF PARTICIPANTS IDENTIFIED AS NOT BEING PARENTS/AS NOT HAVING KIDS IN THE HOME.
58.3% OF PARTICIPANTS IDENTIFIED RACISM AS THE MOST DETRIMENTAL ASPECT OF THE MOMENT
50% OF PARTICIPANTS AGREED THAT POVERTY + RACIAL DISCRIMINATION ARE THE MOST CRITICAL CONCERNS AT THIS MOMENT IN OUR COUNTRIES HISTORY.
54.2% OF PARTICIPANTS ENJOY PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR.
33.3% OF PARTICIPANTS AGREE THAT THEIR FAVORITE ERA FOR HORROR IS THE 1980s + 1990s
79.2% OF PARTICIPANTS IDENTIFIED HUMAN RIGHTS AS THE MOST IMPORTANT DETAIL IN CHARACTERIZING SOCIAL JUSTICE
Candyman (1992): Apt, Horror StATS
Candyman (1992): SubgenreS of horror
Demographic Horror
Pregnancy/ Motherhood Horror
Location Horror
CANDYMAN (1992)
Familial Horror
Historical Horror
Institutional Horror
Candyman (1992): Grounded in reality
April 29, 1992
December 22, 1984
The three officers tried in the beating of Rodney King were acquitted. As a result, there was a three-day riot throughout Los Angeles. In the end, more than 50 people are murdered, an estimated 2,000 were injured, and 8,000 were arrested.
American "vigilante" Bernard Gets rose to national fame when he shot four African-American males on a New York City subway train on December 22, 1984.
October 16, 1992
CandyMan is released worldwide. The pivotal moments captured above draw boundaries that the film dared to cross. As the tangible world remained fixed on concepts of good and evil, Candyman addressed the complex relationship between tragedy and villainy.
Racial Hoaxing: The assailant is described as a black male
Below you will find a list of criminal cases that occurred before and after the release of Candyman (1992). The power of this simple description cannot be understated:
Fannie Taylor(1923)/Carolyn Bryant Donham(1955)/ Elizabeth Diane Downs(1983)/Charles Stuart(1989)/ Gregory Counts and VanDyke Perry(1991)/Jesse Anderson(1992)/Susan Smith(1994)/Sherry Hall (2016)/Patricia Ripley(2020)
Candyman (1992): Compassion as a BONFIRE
And the walls started talking
The bonfire punctuates the final scenes, using compassion to stoke the flames. Residents of Cabrini Green accept demolition as a necessity for rebirth- a crucial piece to reshaping our world.
Fire is a conflicted symbol; it brings both generosity and retribution.
Residents grew frustrated with being a story to cover, a place to dissect, and an experience to bastardize for accolades.
They are victims of stories and tales that shaped society before they existed.
But that isn't their whole story.
Candyman (1992): Repurposing the vision
What is the vision?
1992 a video camera captured one of the country’s most divisive and impactful crimes. In April of that same year, the officers charged with this assault were acquitted, and the nation wept. What the country would now categorize as a 'viral video' played repeatedly on news stations across the US.
Candyman takes this moment to create a remarkable shift in how we see black men's suffering, existence, and enduring spirits. The film complicates accountability and suggests that benefitting from bloodshed is the same as holding the knife, hoisting the rope, and severing the limb.
Upon first (and surface) glance, this operates as a classic revenge narrative, but the film reaches for more than that.
Daniel (Candyman) does not want revenge; he wants to rewrite history. His hauntings are a cautionary tale, a corrective experience, a life for a life.
Candyman challenges the real-world image of black men. The one that's explicitly curated to control some and mislead others.
Candyman is educated, sensitive, enchanting, and complicated. The film's depiction of the black man as a tragic hero figure bleeds into the real world. The vulnerability challenges a manufactured reality where black men are always perpetrators but never the prey.
Candyman (1992): Repurposing the vision
WHAT DANIEL WANTS, CANDYMAN GETS
Candyman (1992): SUBVERT THE Little ones
A BOY AND HIS DOG
Candyman's subversive depiction of black childhood disassociates their existence from danger, aggression, and depravity. Mainstream media is committed to portraits of black masculinity that are restrictive, nefarious, and emotionally devoid.
Jake, the little boy who ushers Helen around Cabrini Green, is framed as a guide, not an aggressor. He symbolizes being free inside your mind, even if the outside is in chains. He is a master of urban lore and American history-- keeping the Black American tradition of oral history and storytelling at the forefront of what is valuable yet underutilized.
Candyman (1992): when the pain is the releif
HELEN DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
Helen thursts herself into the lived experience of those she exploits for academic pursuits. Her aimless tour around the Cabrini Green projects proceeded with a sense of entitlement and apprehension. Her friend seems pensive and anxious about walking through Cabrini Green not because she's terrified, but out of respect.
Candyman (1992): Repurposing the vision
POVERTY PIMP
Treating someone's real life as an exhibit is a common pitfall in academic institutions. While researching her thesis project on oral history and urban legends, Helen treats the residents of Cabrini Green with a callous naivety supported by performative altruism. She sees bylines, test subjects, lab rats, and a data pool but never responsibility. Her voyeurism lays the groundwork for a pulsating nightmare where it has to happen to you for it to matter.
Candyman (1992): when the pain is the releif
LET THERE BE DARK
On trend with the world as we know it-- Helen remains objective in facing inequity until she meets it head-on. To Helen, Cabrini Green is the source material. The bodies are props, and the buildings are anthropological grave sites. She sees an opportunity but lacks the empathy to see the suffering and what part she plays.
Candyman (1995): when the pain is the relief
LOOKING FORWARD TO LOOKING BACK
Candyman 2 (1995) works as a parable, a warning that builds tension. When the lead character uncovers her family connection to the myth of Candyman-- we unravel the history, the pain, and the accountability.
The audience experiences the true story of Candyman, laying the groundwork for taking our distorted past and bringing it to light. The lead character takes charge of her culpability and forces her family to do the same: 'We are his blood,' she screams into her mother's denial. The film calls for those who lived within the bounds of and stood by while racism grew wings.
Candyman (1995): when the pain is the releif
DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE?
The film continues to trail the legacy of interracial coupling. Annie (the lead character) begins to uncover the sources of her family history and inclination toward pain, which unpacks the anxiety around the one-drop rule in American society.
Annie breaches the bounds of her existence or heritage and how it plays into her decisions in life. We first get to know Annie as an inner-city art teacher who is explicitly interested in nurturing the talents and self-esteem of underserved communities.
The legacy of trying to distort history and its appearance, breeding out the blackness to cover things up; proximity is as good as identity.
Candyman (1992): through the mirror
HERE BY MY SIDE
The mirror in Candyman is a weapon-- a portal to narcissistic immunity. Helen abandons the legacy, dragging her friend into the chaos. Helen refuses to see the power differential in pursuing 'studies.'
As traditionally depicted in horror films, the black female friend can present in two extremes. Here, we experience the conscience effort to be informative, cautious, loyal, and sacrificial. Her friend wears the weight of her choices. The mirror acts as a symbol of naivete, only seeing things through your perspective. We are powerless against the intoxication of self.
Helen can only begin to understand her study subject when she is thrust into a life of inequity. When she descends upon Cabrini Green uninvited, it culminates in a vicious assault implemented by a group of young men from the neighborhood. At this moment, confronted by the violence that only happens to other people, Helen looks beyond folklore. This doesn't come easy. To reach this level of awareness, she has to be betrayed by her husband, trapped in police custody, and gaslit after she's framed for child murder. When Candyman says, 'Be my victim,' it's a call to equity in suffering- revenge is best served as what we deserve.
WHAT YOU FEEL, WHAT YOU KNOW
Candyman (1992): through the mirror
Apt, Horror (Community Focus)
THE CASTLE REPORT
A reference to the fictional town at the center of Stephen King's universe known as Castle Rock. In David Cronenberg's 1983 adaptation of the novel 'The Dead Zone', he tells the story of a mild-mannered teacher who is gravely injured in a car accident. He develops a sixth sense when he wakes up after two years in a coma. The power of foresight, the power to intervene. That's the power this report has if we're willing to unlock it. A Castle Report is the blueprint for reading between the lines, promoting proactivity alongside self-advocacy, and encouraging mutual accountability.
OVERARCHING THEME: NARCISSISTIC IMMUNITY
Narcissistic immunity is the (erroneous) feeling, harbored by the narcissist, that they are immune to the consequences of their actions. They will never be affected by the results of their own decisions, opinions, beliefs, deeds, misdeeds, acts, inaction, and by their membership in certain groups of people. Helen represents the cultural obsession with calling a truce rather than examining the behavior that led to the breakdown. (Read the source article to learn more)
Encourage artistic expression as an interpreter:
The power of paintings, images, and reflections within the film make a pointed observation-charity starts at home.
+ Cabrini Green: the visuals in line with a lock of resources include: The bathroom, the little boy, the bonfire.
Preserve our history of Storytelling:
+ Storytelling as salvation, revelation, and underutilized historical archives.
Preserve our history of Storytelling:
+The power of black women: Contrasting images of servitude with intellectual prowess.
+Utilizing the narrative where black women are comforting, fair, nurturing, and to be used as a means to an end.
In order for Helen understanding her own role in this legacy, even at a distance, requires facing her everyday world head-on, and empowering others to save themselves.
Community self-sustainability/ Community Resources:
Preserve our history of Storytelling:
+Local historians. She doesn't intend to pay them any mind as they clean up the room and hallway near her. Helen wanted to hear first-hand stories from those who were there, and n her blind pursuit of academic achievement, she forgot that there are people too.
Community self-sustainability/ Community Resources:
+Bearing witness to others' pain, struggle, or circumstantial challenges.
Candyman (1992): what they need us to know
Feel like talking? want to know more? Use my contact info below to get in touch
NAME RULES
Professional Credits: Ava M. Fields
Introducing me: Ava
Casual communications + Zoom meetings: Ava or Avie
THEHORRORADVOCATE@gmail.com
Boston, MA
@ahorroradvocate
How do you Pronounce Ava? (see the Austrian pronunciation)