Candyman (1992 film)

Candyman
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Bernard Rose
Screenplay by	Bernard Rose
Based on	"The Forbidden" by Clive Barker
Produced by	Steve Golin Sigurjon Sighvatsson Alan Poul
Starring	Virginia Madsen Tony Todd Xander Berkeley Kasi Lemmons
Cinematography	Anthony B. Richmond
Edited by	Dan Rae
Music by	Philip Glass
Production companies	Propaganda Films[1] PolyGram Filmed Entertainment[1]
Distributed by	TriStar Pictures[1]
Release dates	September 11, 1992 (1992-09-11) (TIFF) October 16, 1992 (1992-10-16) (United States)
Running time	101 minutes[1]
Country	United States[1]
Language	English
Budget	$8–9 million[1]
Box office	$25.8 million (US)[2]

Candyman is a 1992 American gothic supernatural black horror film, written and directed by Bernard Rose and starring Virginia Madsen, Tony Todd, Xander Berkeley, Kasi Lemmons, and Vanessa E. Williams. Based on Clive Barker's short story "The Forbidden", the film follows a Chicago graduate student completing a thesis on urban legends and folklore, which leads her to the legend of the "Candyman", the ghost of an African-American artist and son of a slave who was murdered in the late 19th century for his relationship with the daughter of a wealthy white man.

The film came to fruition after a chance meeting between Rose and Barker who recently completed his own film adaptation of Nightbreed (1990). Rose expressed interest in Barker's story "The Forbidden", and Barker agreed to license the rights. Where Barker's story revolved around the themes of the British class system in contemporary Liverpool, Rose chose to refit the story to Cabrini-Green's public housing development in Chicago and instead focus on the themes of race and social class in the inner-city United States.

Candyman premiered at the 1992 Toronto International Film Festival, and was theatrically released on October 16, 1992, by TriStar Pictures and PolyGram Filmed Entertainment. It received generally positive reviews and grossed over $25 million in the US, where it was also regarded in some critical circles as a contemporary classic of horror cinema.^[3] It was followed by three sequels: Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh (1995), Candyman 3: Day of the Dead (1999), and Candyman (2021) which the latter serves as a direct-sequel to the original.