Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh

A nice take on the traditional maniac-meets-girl horror story. [18 Mar 1995, p.C08]

As the vengeful Candyman, Tony Todd remains both a tragic victim and a frightfully menacing supposition, enough so that you'll think twice before repeating that full Candyman mantra in front of your bathroom mirror. Read full review

Farewell to the Flesh exhibits a savvy awareness of its own political limitations. Read full review

While it may still pale in comparison to its predecessor, Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh deserves more acclaim. Read full review

Director Condon displays a sure hand with material that could easily have turned out far worse, making this a nicely disturbing piece of work that rises well above the conventions of the genre almost all the way through. Read full review

The script is constructed too much like a novel, which slows the pace of the early, establishing sections. Director Bill Condon works too hard to tie all the plot strands into a neat bow. Read full review

The movie doesn't develop, alas, with the patience and restraint of the earlier film. Read full review

Since Barker’s baroque prose visions are too complex for the gore-hound market, they’re bound to be watered down into this kind of bilge. Read full review

Director Bill Condon has a sense of style but a heavy hand with actors -- you can all but hear them telling themselves to hit their marks and punch out their lines. [20 Mar 1995, p.F2]

Once again, Philip Glass composes one of his insistent scores -- and again the effect is pretentious, considering the circumstances. Director Bill Condon has a sense of style but a heavy hand with actors -- you can all but hear them telling themselves to hit their marks and punch out their lines. [17 Mar 1995, p.H28]

Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh is a just-better-than-routine horror sequel that watches in chilly admiration as some sort of apparition steps out of mirrors and performs atrocities on the unwary. [17 Mar 1995]

Producer Barker (who is only credited with the story idea for the original), director Bill Condon (filling in for the original's Bernard Rose) and his writers have crammed this movie so full of killings and razzle-dazzle MTV imagery that it has very little of what made the first Candyman so effective: genuine suspense. [17 Mar 1995]

Mostly, however, Candyman: Farewell To The Flesh is content to rely on easy jolts and an overabundance of fake-out scares, rather than hard-earned suspense. It’s never awful, but it also never feels necessary. Mostly, it proves that even the most innovative horror concepts can find ways to spin their wheels. Read full review

Fortunately, Candyman isn't powerful enough to do much harm. The credits are more intriguing than the film. Read full review

This lackluster sequel forgoes everything that made the original a superior horror film in favor of simplistic genre cliches. Read full review

Nowhere near as creepy as the original, nor as effective a scarer. Read full review

Barker, who wasn't involved with the earlier Candyman, has never yet matched his stunning 1987 writer-director debut Hellraiser-and he never will if he keeps coming up with projects like this. [17 Mar 1995, p.J]

Bill Condon's Candyman II: Farewell To The Flesh is a woefully inadequate sequel with straight-to-video written all over it. [30 Nov 1995, p.T9]

As directed by Bill Condon (Sister, Sister) it could be redubbed "Farewell to the Fresh," having been watered down into a standard, run-of-the-mill slasher film, the only remaining hook being the one that its one-handed heavy uses to impale his victims. [17 Mar 1995]

The least they could have done with the sequel Candyman : Farewell to the Flesh is make it scary. How they managed to give us a killer with a bloody hook going around eviscerating people and have him come off as mild as a butterfly is boggling. Read full review

Dumber sequels to dumb horror movies, such as the Friday the 13th series, are, of course, nothing new. [17 Mar 1995, p.06]

With the original Candyman, the filmmakers took chances in their efforts to scare you. With the sequel, they are simply chasing the quick and easy buck. [17 Mar 1995, p.4G]

At last! - a movie that combines the most lurid and irresponsible aspects of the "Mandingo" black-exploitation yarns of the '70s with the gratuitous violence and ubiquitous gore of today's horror cheapies. [17 Mar 1995, p.L34]

Candyman was the best Clive Barker adaptation to date. This follow-up is a travesty of both its literary source and the original film. Read full review