UB Film Spotlight: Cast + Director & Producer Talk ‘Candyman’

Filmmaker Nia DaCosta directs the incarnation of the cult classic.

For as long as residents can remember, the housing projects of Chicago’s Cabrini-Green neighborhood were terrorized by a word-of-mouth ghost story about a supernatural killer with a hook for a hand, easily summoned by those daring to repeat his name five times into a mirror.

In present day, a decade after the last of the Cabrini towers were torn down, visual artist Anthony McCoy and his partner, gallery director Brianna Cartwright, move into a luxury loft condo in Cabrini, now gentrified beyond recognition and inhabited by upwardly mobile millennials.

With Anthony’s painting career on the brink of stalling, a chance encounter with a Cabrini-Green old-timer exposes Anthony to the tragically horrific nature of the true story behind Candyman.

Anxious to maintain his status in the Chicago art world, Anthony begins to explore these macabre details in his studio as fresh grist for paintings, unknowingly opening a door to a complex past that unravels his own sanity and unleashes a terrifying wave of violence that puts him on a collision course with destiny.

UB Spotlight‘s the film with Vanessa Williams and Jordan Peele reminding us of the original Candyman, while Colman Domingo and Nia DaCosta share the importance of “say my name” and how it relates to today’s movement.