Blog Post #3
Maya Nejat Haim
After watching both versions of Candyman and discussing them in class and in our section, I started to have a different opinion for the original movie. When I watch a horror movie (which you usually wont catch me doing) , I usually focus on the scary parts and what happens to the characters. I don’t really think about whose perspetive the story is showing or how certain people are being represented. My class discussion helped me realize that a movie can be entertaining and still have a deeper message that might not be realzied first, but when thought about and analyed has a deep meaning.
What surprised me about the first Candyman is how he harms people in his neighborhood. In the film his backstory is about racist violence and he was violently killed for being a Black man in love with a white woman. I wondered why he ends up harming other Black people instead of focusing on the people responsble for what happened to him. Before class I didn’t really think about it that much. This led me to ask why he is a monster people should be afraid of, when his own origin is based on racism and violence.
Get Mnejathaim’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
After learning about the white gaze also changed my idea on the original film. Helen is a white graduate student who is studying Cabrini-Green, and the story is mostly told through her perspective. I can now see that film more on her experinces than the experiences of the Black memebers in the community. I assumed Helen was the main character in the movie, but now I see how storytelling influences how we see and view everyone.
The 2020 version focused more on Black history, gentrification, and how black comunities are treateed. The Monster Candyman is not just represented as a scary figure, he also is associated with finding justice and remembering the violence. Instead of asking why he is scary, I can also see what his story represennts and how he becomes a symbol.
Another thing that stood out to me was Anthony being an artist. The white art dealer seems to be more interested by art that showcases Blackness and Black pain. It made me wonder about who is in control of what stories are being told and in what way. If someone only feels the need to see art centered around the pain of another group of people, is that person trying to learn and understand this pain or is this person only looking for the way it appears to them? I feel like this is an interesting question to think about especially with the movie industry.
I tried to think of another movie that made me think about how our understanding of a movie can change when we learn more about what is really happening. I thought about Shutter Island because when I accept a story, it is sometimes easy for me to just go with the story that I am presented without questioning if I am truly seeing everything. The Candyman discussion brought me back to that idea. Since I am not Black, I cannot speak for Black people’s experiences, but I can listen to what we talked about in class and carefully think about how those expeiences are shown in kovies. Seeing both versions of Candyman helped me realize it is important whose voice is telling the story and whose the audience is hearing. While a horror movie can scare us, they can also make us think about real world issues.
