07-07-2019, 12:32 PM
Candyman (1992)
I hadn't seen this since the VHS days, so Arrow's new razor-sharp 4K reconstruction of the "uncut" UK Theatrical Version was quite the upgrade. However, the increased clarity does draw attention to the not quite convincing lighting/dressing of the interior sets (I reckon I even saw the top of the set once). They shot some of the movie in real dilapidated/abandoned buildings in Chicago, so I don't know why they bothered with costly sets, when real grime and decay was on hand for free. I remembered 'Candyman' as an above average Slasher-Horror but watching again, I was more impressed by the psychological aspects. Director Bernard Rose is careful to never make the Candyman killer explicitly real, so he could be a facet of Virginia Madsen's character's subconscious mind.
The official BFI 93rd best British film...
Caravaggio (1986)
Derek Jarman's unorthodox biopic of the famous painter takes place wholly within the shadowy interior world of his canvases (IIRC there are no exterior shots). The narrative also shares the same preoccupations with sex, power, love, death and bloody violence. Jarman sprinkles in deliberately anachronistic details like calculators, motorbikes and typewriters, making it feel like the present day and the past simultaneously. Nigel Terry plays the artist with intensity and Tilda Swinton and Sean Bean make their screen debuts... Sean's character, true to form, meets a bloody end.
I hadn't seen this since the VHS days, so Arrow's new razor-sharp 4K reconstruction of the "uncut" UK Theatrical Version was quite the upgrade. However, the increased clarity does draw attention to the not quite convincing lighting/dressing of the interior sets (I reckon I even saw the top of the set once). They shot some of the movie in real dilapidated/abandoned buildings in Chicago, so I don't know why they bothered with costly sets, when real grime and decay was on hand for free. I remembered 'Candyman' as an above average Slasher-Horror but watching again, I was more impressed by the psychological aspects. Director Bernard Rose is careful to never make the Candyman killer explicitly real, so he could be a facet of Virginia Madsen's character's subconscious mind.
The official BFI 93rd best British film...
Caravaggio (1986)
Derek Jarman's unorthodox biopic of the famous painter takes place wholly within the shadowy interior world of his canvases (IIRC there are no exterior shots). The narrative also shares the same preoccupations with sex, power, love, death and bloody violence. Jarman sprinkles in deliberately anachronistic details like calculators, motorbikes and typewriters, making it feel like the present day and the past simultaneously. Nigel Terry plays the artist with intensity and Tilda Swinton and Sean Bean make their screen debuts... Sean's character, true to form, meets a bloody end.