Movie Review: Candy

By Ronald Wilkinson Nov 12, 2006, 2:45 GMT

If you thought Heath Ledger had a tough life as Ennis, the gay ranch hand in ‘Brokeback Mountain,’ you ain’t seen nuttin’ yet. 

In Neil Armfield’s breakout directorial effort Ledger plays half of the junkie couple of Candy and Dan, two young kids who start using heroine for fun and gradually decide that it beats real life---until there is no more life left. 

Blockbuster Oscar winner Geoffrey Rush (‘Quills,’ ‘Shine,’ ‘The Life and Death of Peter Sellers’) plays Casper, the “accidental mentor” to the young couple and their guiding light to the nihilistic world of addiction. Smart, moneyed and with useful laboratory skills and contacts, he has access to medical-quality drugs and the safety-net of a professional environment.

His presence both encourages Candy and Dan in their downward journey and, by comparison, emphasizes the couple’s helplessness. His best quote, “When you can quit, you don’t want to and when you want to, you can’t,” sums up the movie. If you stop watching at that point, you get ninety percent of the message.

‘Candy’ will be compared to ‘Requiem for a Dream’ as a cautionary tale exposing the self-destruction of drug addiction. In “Requiem” the young couple starts experimenting and eventually loses everything to the habit. The losses start with money, property, a job and a place to live; but that is only the beginning. 

In what is still the king of dreadful druggie films the leads in “Requiem” not only lose every vestige of human dignity, but actual body parts as well. 

But “Candy” stops short of the physical mayhem of drug poisoning and sticks with the reduction of human behavior to something more akin to that of a rodent. This is where Candy’s mom and pop come in.

Played by multiple award winners Noni Hazlehurst and Tony Martin, the film traces their trajectory from hopeful parental ignorance to bald cuckolded betrayal as their daughter and son-in-law gradually make their mental and emotional infirmity obvious in front of mom, pop and their social peers.  In this way the drug-anesthetized children are able to project their degradation onto the parents and so destroy their lives as well.  We have the substitution of collateral damage to the addict’s loved ones for the physical damage to the addict’s body. A good trade-off in terms of powerful film-making but, of course, a message likely lost on addicts. 

The first half of the film moves faster than the last half. At the risk of seeming cold, the most interesting part of the story is seeing the young lovers gradually become addicted with the help of the doomed Casper.

It is interesting that in its first fifteen minutes the story progresses to the end point of "Requiem" when Marion (Jennifer Connelly) is finally reduced to hard-core prostitution. Those having seen both will wonder where “Candy” will go from there, and the answer is that it doesn’t go much of anywhere except to screen repeated graphic examples of why addiction is not such a great idea. The predictable yelling and screaming does not add significantly to the story.

The withdrawal scenes are good, similar to the itching, twitching and convulsions of Renton (Ewan McGregor) in ‘Trainspotting’ but without the psychedelic spiders of Nicol Williamson’s cocaine withdrawal in the Sherlock Holmes tale ’Seven Percent Solution.’

The loving couple sharing the withdrawal experience is powerful; each suffering alone, together, their love left behind in the convulsive craving of their bodies and minds for the one thing they really want.

The eventual fate to befall Candy, although predictable, is as powerful an indictment of drug use yet seen on screen.

The last half of the film is more emoting that the audience has already thoroughly rehearsed in their minds well before it comes on the screen.

To give credit where due, that may be what addiction is, over and over. But that does not necessarily make for a good film.  A better tactic might have been to let the audience imagine the screaming and just show the actors aging, like the teeth falling out in the National Geo meth special.  No screaming required.

Also has similar subject matter to last August's ‘Half Nelson,’ except "Nelson" leaves us with a ray of hope, whereas ‘Candy’ just states the losses that can never be regained, like the lost arm and the lost dignity in the tighter and more powerful "Requiem."

A good film with a great lesson to tell.  The problem is the right people will never watch it.

Limited USA release November 17. MPAA: Rated R for pervasive depiction of drug addiction, disturbing images, language, sexual content