Taglines: Take one or else.
Bad Candy follows local Halloween stories of both myth and lessons learned in the community of New Salem. With its annual Psychotronic FM Halloween show, re-enactment radio DJs Chilly Billy and Paul weave the tales of the supernatural of years gone by. In this small town it’s a grimy ending for most, but will a few good souls survive?
Bad Candy is a 2020 American anthology horror film directed by Scott B. Hansen and Desiree Connell. It stars Zach Galligan, Michael Aaron Milligan, Derek Russo, Kevin Wayne, Kenneth Trujillo, Corey Taylor, Tara DiPetrillo, Samantha Noel Van Sickle, Natalia Nova, Tordy Clark and Riley Sutton.
Bad Candy premiered at the Grimmfest International Festival of Fantastic Film in Manchester, on October 31, 2020. It later screened at the SouthSide Film Festival in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in June 2021. The film is distributed by Dread, and is set to receive a limited theatrical release on September 10, 2021. It is scheduled to be released on video-on-demand on September 14, and on Blu-ray on September 28, 2021.
Film Review for Bad Candy
It seems like every year, the Halloween season begins a little earlier, offering fans of the holiday a chance to turn the event into a lifestyle for several months. Emerging as the first spooky offering for upcoming Halloween countdown lists is “Bad Candy,” which hopes to bring a little terror to viewers hunting for a high during the post-Labor Day week.
It’s an anthology film from directors Scott B. Hansen and Desiree Connell, who try to pack a lot of ghoulish events and demented characters into multiple stories. The picture is filled with macabre events, creepy lighting, and tales of abhorrent behavior, but “Bad Candy” often plays like a feature that wasn’t rigidly worked on in the editing room. It’s frustratingly random at times, with a limited sense of dramatic position when dealing with various tales of misery. Atmosphere is here, but so is a chaotic feel for storytelling, with the helmers frequently just throwing scenes at the audience to see what sticks.
The town of New Salem takes Halloween very seriously, especially the guys at Psychotronic Radio, with DJ Chilly Billy (Corey Taylor) and producer Paul (Zach Galligan, who has to endure a “Gremlins” joke) spending the holiday sharing special stories of horror with listeners. They explore fear building within young Kyra (Riley Sutton), a girl who’s trying to appease her abusive stepfather, eventually finding a magical way to deal with his violence after the death of her mother.
Charlie (Ryan Kiser) is a drug dealer trying to make friends and future clients at a local concert, making a big mistake when he elects to contact a mysterious phone number posted on a bathroom wall. And ride share driver Daryl (Kenneth Trujillo) loves Halloween, dressing up as a vampire as he moves customers around town, showing special interest in a dismissive prostitute and her hostile pimp.
“Bad Candy” isn’t confident with introductions. Instead of gradually establishing the illness of New Salem, the picture pounds viewers with images of brutality and anger, including a moment where Kyla’s stepfather, a boozing monster, casually runs over a stranded motorist, leaving a huge bloodstain on the front of his truck.
What this incident has to do with the rest of the movie isn’t addressed, and it’s part of a grand scheme from the helmers to simply slap viewers with bits of information. There’s the radio team in Chilly Billy and Paul, but even their place in the flow of “Bad Candy” is obscured for some reason, as little time is spent with DJ storytelling until the final 15 minutes of the feature. Everything that happens before that almost has a dream logic to it as the endeavor stumbles from one segment to the next.
“Bad Candy” seems to be on to something with the early arrival of a little boy dressed as Dracula. He delights in destroying Halloween decorations and smashing pumpkins, offending Kyla’s friends, and he’s quickly confronted by an evil clown who turns the child into a wood figure placed into a decorative Halloween scene. However, this event, which certainly seems like it’s going to become the connective tissue between segments, is only used once, with “Bad Candy” quickly moving on to its next horror show, which involves Kayla’s battle with her stepfather, using a magic pencil to create helpful creatures.
The feature offers a variety of grim tales, including a brief stay with a local creep who loves to tamper with his candy offerings and baked goods, slipping razor blades into cupcakes. The movie is better off with tiny ideas, as the writing struggles to come up with conclusions for many of the stories, simply trusting in the power of frightening imagery to dazzle audiences. Cinematography by Hansen and Blake Studwell is certainly accomplished for this type of filmmaking, but style can’t hide the emptiness of the viewing experience, and unconvincing visual effects often expose the production’s shoestring budget.
“Bad Candy” winds through chapters that deal with prostitutes, ride share weirdness, bathroom destruction, and, perhaps most vividly, the dangers of necrophilia. The radio boys are returned to periodically, but they only really matter to the screenplay in the final tale, which follows paranormal investigators inside a spooky old house with a history of violence.
There seems to be a theme of retribution in the mix, but Hansen and Connell don’t offer an organized picture to really hang their big idea high. “Bad Candy” is a messy endeavor, and with lowered seasonal demands, perhaps its disjointedness will suffice, but in the grand tradition of horror anthology releases, it doesn’t have the consistency to really deliver prime Halloween escapis
Bad Candy (2021)
Directed by: Scott B. Hansen, Desiree Connell
Starring: Zach Galligan, Michael Aaron Milligan, Derek Russo, Kevin Wayne, Kenneth Trujillo, Corey Taylor, Tara DiPetrillo, Samantha Noel Van Sickle, Natalia Nova, Tordy Clark, Riley Sutton
Screenplay by: Scott B. Hansen, Desiree Connell
Production Design by: Desiree Connell
Cinematography by: Scott B. Hansen, Blake Studwell
Film Editing by: Scott B. Hansen
Art Direction by: Shane Morton, Robert Simmons
Music by: Chris Dudley
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Epic Pictures
Release Date: October 31, 2020 (Grimmfest), September 10, 2021 (United States)
Views: 70
